Charlottetown
by katherine-with-a-k
Summary: Returning from her adventures as a reporter Anne Shirley receives a surprise inheritance, a run-down bookshop in Charlottetown. Determined to make a success she wins the adoration of a wealthy businessman, Will Baron, a roguish Naval Officer, Davy Rossi, and her childhood friend, Gilbert Blythe. Each man wants her for his own. All Anne wants is to be free...
1. Before we begin

_**Hello again.**_

 _ **When I wrote Anotherlea I always had its sequel in mind.**_ _ **I began it because I wanted to see if I could take the characters and ending of Anne of Green Gables in another direction. In that story Josie creates AVIS, Diana goes to Queens, Marilla falls in love, and Anne gets lost in a snowstorm, loses her teaching job, hunts down a missing boy, and decides to become a journalist. There is also a lot of stuff about grief, duty, the ups and downs of sex, secrets, wisdom, fear, and love. In the end Gilbert leaves for Redmond to begin his B.A. and Anne goes to the Charlottetown to become a journalist.**_

 _ **Charlottetown picks up this story four years later. Gilbert has graduated and Anne is a journalist in Regina, Saskatchewan, covering the North West Rebellion of 1885...**_

 _ **...**_

 _ **CHARLOTTETOWN**  
_

 _ **with love and gratitude to L.M.M. ~ everything is hers, only this idea is mine.**_

 _..._

 _As I was walking by the clear spring_

 _I found the water so lovely I had to bathe_

 _Under the oak's leaves I lay and I dried_

 _On the highest bough a nightengale sang_

 _I have loved you for so long_

 _I will never forget you..._

 _I lost my love though I did not deserve it_

 _Because of the rosebud I kept from him_

 _I wish the rose was still on the bush_

 _And my sweetheart loved me still_

 _I have loved you for so long_

 _I will never forget you..._

French-Canadian folk song.

 _..._

"God cannot create a tribe without locating it. We are not birds, we stand upon the ground."

Louis Riel, 1885

 _..._

 ** _Prologue_  
**

It isn't the light that wakes her, though it burns so bright through the canvas she has taken to wearing a blindfold. It isn't the wails of injured men or mules braying to be set free. It is the wind that pulls her from sleep. Its great gusting arms set the guy-lines to shrieking, and beat on the tents like drums.

The short rest has left her thirsty and her hand is on her flask before the dreams have left her head. It is filled with cold boiled water; Gilbert taught her to do that -and many things besides. She thinks of him as she runs her finger over her teeth and rinses with a precious mouthful. The women are forbidden to go to the lake, and the men... well the men have rum.

She winds her thick braids round her head and is hunting out a hairpin, when an older woman clad in black ducks her head into the tent.

'Anne. Come.'

'Yes, Mother- let me tie my boots-' she answers, then looks at her feet and remembers she slept in them.

Outside the wind does its best to throw her coat-tails over her head. Beneath it Anne wears two thick sweaters and a pair of leather breeches. They are stiff from weeks of wear and surely smell, but the wind carries that away. Like a blade it runs right through her, and she yanks her beret over her ears and buries her hands in her pockets. The Mays she has known on the Island are nothing to this. Half the militia arrived in the west with frostbitten fingers or rattling coughs. It took less than two weeks to transport them to from Ontario to Saskatchewan; the officers in saloon cars, their men like cattle in open wagons. Where the railway stopped they were marched through open country; some to battle Poundmaker, others to Big Bear, and the rest to take the traitor, Louis Riel. He was said to be a madman, a savage, a murderer, and is now holed up in the small town of Batoche. Those that fight with him have run out of bullets and load their rifles with pebbles and nails.

'It won't be long now,' Mother Hannah says.

She sits at her desk made from crates and a wagon seat. It used to be covered with broadcloth but that was requisitioned or stolen; Hannah does not care to know. So long as no one touches her medicines or her girls she is content. Anne is neither nun nor nurse, but a reporter from the Regina Leader. Hannah doesn't think much of journalists but this one has proved useful. She threads her reedy fingers together and clears her wimpled throat.

'Sergeant Forge reports that a white flag has been sighted in Batoche.'

'Riel surrendered?'

'You sound disappointed,' says Hannah, she purses her lips against a smile and strokes the cross at her breast.

'Of course not, no... ' Anne gushes, 'surprised perhaps. Some men say he is a prophet sent from God-'

The cross is abandoned as Hannah strikes her hand against the desk top. 'I forbade you to talk to the men, Anne. Your condition upon staying here was to assist myself and Sister Ruth.'

'I remember your condition, Mother.'

'I should hope you do. But as it looks like an accord is about to be reached it falls upon me to inquire what you plan to do next.'

'Is Captain Peters returned?' Anne asks, thoughtfully. She pulls off her beret and smooths down violent red hair. Sister Ruth once joked that Anne should keep her head covered lest someone mistake her for a fox and take a shot at her. 'I must see him before I go, or his photographs at least, if he would agree to publishing them in The Leader...'

'You're leaving us then?'

'Of course- I must!' Anne declares, her eyes almost laughing.

Hannah purses her lips again. She does not believe Anne wants to go; what she lacks is a reason to stay. Hannah is resolved to give her one. She discovered Anne a month ago fleeing from Batoche. The first thing did was fling her pack onto one of the wagons and ride ahead with the scouts. They were seeking out the best place for the aid station and wanted somewhere far from the scrub. The Cree hid there and could pick off ten men before anyone knew about it. Anne stuck her oar in. They must have wood, for there was little around on the wide open plains, which would leave them at risk of exposure. The prairies paid no heed to the seasons; the winds brought snow in June, and seared them away in January. The camp needed fuel to feed the fires and reliable source of water. Not only for those who came back with bullet holes, but for the surgeon and nurses too. Anne spent her first days making up drafts of yarrow and milkweed. Later she found a young stray called Joe to do the job instead. It is this connection to the boy Hannah appeals to. He dotes on Anne as though she was his sister; surely the girl will not leave him?

Anne laughs again, a sound this time, that slips from her cracked pink lips. When she last saw Joe he was nursing a red ear after the quartermaster discovered he'd been finishing the rations of men too ill to eat.

'Joe won't leave, not when he's getting regular meals. Excuse me now, Mother, I must find Captain Peters.'

Anne discovers him a week later on a paddle steamer heading down river. She knew he would be one of the first to leave. He is a correspondent for the Quebec Chronicle and carries a camera Anne had never seen before. She burned with envy the first time she saw it. When she asked what it was he had simply said, 'Truth.'

He sits with the other officers in what used to be a ballroom. The Northcote was once a pleasure boat, now it transports troops and munitions along the South Saskatchewan River, its fine metal railings plugged with sandbags and sacks. In daylight hours the wounded are brought to the deck for the air, at night they are returned to quarters. Excepting one poor soul whose wounds reek like spoiled meat. Anne decides to stay with him. People ignore her if she keeps herself busy, but that's not the only reason she is remains above deck. Whenever she heads below the sound of the paddles striking the water is drowned out by her thumping heart. Not for the first time she misses Joe, he would have got food to her when it was still half warm. By the time she feeds Private Ferrar her meal is always congealed and cold.

'What are you thinking when you look up at the stars like that?' John Ferrar asks her.

'Home,' Anne answers, unthinkingly, then quickly shakes her head. 'I mean Regina.'

'Regina's not your home, then?'

'It isn't anybody's. Everyone in that town comes from some place else.' The girl does not stop looking at the stars as she says this, and mutters, almost to herself, 'Why is this boat so slow?'

'My father is a river pilot, gone to the Nile to save Gordon's men. I would always urge him faster and he would always say to me: there are old pilots and there are bold pilots, Johnny-cake, but there are no _old bold_ pilots. A river needs reading, see. There's no hurrying its meaning... unless you like getting sunk.'

Anne can hear the chink of glass from the ballroom above them; sees light from the chandelier sway to and fro.

'That's why I love the stars, you know where you are with them.'

'Then you belong to the sea, Miss-'

' _Belong?_ '

'There are river people and there are sea people...' he says faintly.

'Let me tell you of my people,' Anne cuts in, she can tell he is tiring and wraps her coat around his own. He could pass for one of her brothers; he has Davy's blue eyes and Gilbert's curly hair. She clasps his trembling hand and wills herself to continue. 'They live by a brook that has its source in a spring; a secret cascade that dips and whirls among curled ferns and white violets, red rocks and silver birches, and swells the Lake of Shining Waters. By the time it reaches the main road, however, it is a well-conducted stream. It has to be if it wants to get by Mrs Lynde-'

'Who-' John rasps.

Anne smiles from her heart and looks up at the stars again. She is not trying to hold her nose above the stench anymore, she is trying to hide her tears. Private Ferrars isn't tiring. He will never leave this steamer, she knows that now and determines to tell him such a story, one that will free him from his rotting body, and her aching one, and carry them like a wind to the sky.

'Yes, Johnny-cake. She was sitting and knitting and minding her own business when a man named Matthew Cuthbert drove his buggy to Bright River...'

She is describing how to make a house of snow when Captain James Peters appears on deck. He leans against the sandbags and lights a half-smoked cigar.

'You know he's gone, don't you?' he says between sucks.

Anne nods. Though she is numb with cold and sorrow her eyes still seek the camera that always hangs from the Captain's shoulder.

'It's locked away, young lady, and you will be too if you're looking to thieve.'

Anne tucks her coat over the Private's grey face and heads toward the prow of the steamer, motioning the Captain to follow. He is handsome in his way, too old for her, but still... there is something about his quiet eyes, the thick moustache hiding sensitive lips.

'I'm not a thief, Captain Peters, excepting stories of course-'

'You're a writer?'

'A correspondent, like you.'

James Peters snorts. Anne expects this and brings out a piece of newsprint she keeps tucked inside the lining of her jacket.

'That's me,' she says, pointing to the byline.

'So ho! The infamous Claire Fontaine. Just like the song.'

'I thought the name rather apt since my editor has me singing for my supper...'

The Captain snorts a second time, this time in sympathy. He signals two men to deal with the corpse and relights his cigar. The smell reminds Anne of Matthew's pipe. She looks up at the stars again, revealing luminous skin at her throat. Peters hasn't been this close to loveliness since he left his wife in Montreal. A moment later he bows and departs and Anne knows she won't see him again.

She doesn't tell her editor this when she returns to the newsroom some days later. Mr Davin is too full of his own news, and as usual his own importance. The government wants the rebels tried in Regina; The Leader will have the ear of the nation! Anne isn't as excited as she ought to be, in fact she had planned on resigning. While she missed her bed, her bath, and her books, after living in the wilds for two months the small town feels like a cage.

It is a cage she walks into when she smuggles herself into Riel's cell that November. She is disguises herself as Mother Hannah but the condemned man remembers Anne's face.

'I saw you at the trial and loved you,' he says, smiling as though she was his child.

Anne cannot smile back. Her French is not as good as it should be and she keeps her head low and carefully transcribes his every word. Later she types it out for the pressman, and a resignation letter to Davin, then throws her breeches into the furnace and steps into her favourite dress.

Her skirts fill out like the sails of a ship as she stands on the platform and waits for the train. There is no one to see her go so she holds out her arms above her bare head and embraces the great gushing air. Scarlet clouds span the sky, as a mighty Snow Eater bears down. The north-west wind like a hand at her back, guiding her eastward and home.

...

I hope you missed my footnotes because I have a lot...

 _* the folk song A la claire fontaine (By the clear spring) has been beloved in the French Maritimes since the 17th century. There are many versions, I chose this one because it suits the story I am going to write. I got the idea of using it as a pen name when I was researching the famous stunt reporter, Elizabeth Cochran, who took her name, Nellie Bly, from a song._

 _* if you look up 'Victorian women in Pants, Breeches and Pantaloons' you will discover women have always worn the trousers!_

 _* 'a well conducted stream' from chapter one, Anne of Green Gables_

 _* 'I saw you at the trial...' from an article written by journalist Mary Mclean, who disguised herself as a priest in order to get Riel's last interview before he was executed._

 _* a snow eater is a foehn wind, you might remember me writing about it in The Windy Willows love letters. Gilbert called it a chinook._

 _* Louis Riel, Chief Poundmaker, Chief Big Bear, The Regina Leader, Captain James Peters, Mother Hannah Grier Coome, Nicholas Flood Davin, the Northcote, General Gordon at the Nile, and the North West rebellion (resistance) of 1885, are all based on fact, I just moved them around as required because this is fiction not a history lesson :o)_

The music for this story (because every story starts with music) is The Shipping News by Christopher Young. That soaring penny whistle and the heart beat of the bodhran -ah!

Thank you all for reading!


	2. Liberty, equality, fraternity

**_1_**

The shore of White Sands is set out like a tricolour. As the train rounds the headland and enters the bay Anne is struck by the red of the cliff face, the white of the sand, and a sea of December blue. She looks a bit like a French flag herself, except her coat is more indigo, and her skin while white at her secret parts is tanned from her time out west. The result is a strange sort of alchemy: copper eyebrows are gold, copper lashes are bronze. Only her eyes hint at what she has seen. Worn to a verdigris –all the grey gone to green.

Diana does not notice. They have been friends for so long they see each other as heart sees heart, everything else is just wrapping. Besides she always considered Anne exotic, from her elfish looks to her bold opinions; the fact she is as brown as a gypsy comes as no surprise.

'You poor thing,' she says, from the iron clinch of Anne's arms, 'what a day to come back. You must be frozen.'

Anne barely feels it, and when she gets to the tearoom her raw silk jacket and best kid gloves are given to the waitress along with her coat and scarf. Beneath it she wears a matching dress with a mandarin collar, and an apron front skirt with a bustle-like bow, all in a sky-bright blue.

'Prairie blue,' says Anne, sipping her cocoa.

She takes it with only the merest drop of cream and it now occurs to her why; Diana's eyes are the same rich colour. Her skin is as fine as the teacup she holds, down to the rosebuds on each cheek. She's very much the girl Anne pledged her heart to when she was eleven; tender, dimpled, merry, modish... though perhaps not the last one, for Diana's hat and beaded purse are very much last season.

'I missed you, how I _missed_ you!' Anne declares, so loudly those who made a point of not staring at the radiant girls at the corner table feel justified to do so.

'I'll believe that when you answer one question,' Diana says, leaning forward to pinch Anne's pointed chin. 'Tell me true, Miss _Fontaine_ , are you really back for good?'

Anne shrugs, her wide eyes teasing.

'You Islanders, so greedy for your own.'

'Islanders?' Diana frowns. 'You only just got here, who else have you seen to ask you that?'

Anne studies her hand for a moment. Now that she has removed her gloves she spots a smudge on her skin. 'Just Gilbert,' she answers, working on her finger. 'I wired him in New Brunswick to say I would be home for Christmas and he met me during my stop in Kingsport.'

' _And..._ does medical school agree with him?'

The question takes Anne to the moment she alighted from the train and saw him by the news stand. Strange, she cannot recall what he looked like, only what she felt: a quick disappointment swallowed by a singular joy. She doesn't say this however, it wouldn't make sense and Diana would use the rest of the afternoon trying to work out her meaning. Instead Anne smiles, a wicked one, and raises her brows.

'I should say so. He's more handsome than ever –and clever and good. I sometimes think it's a shame he went into medicine. When he strode down the platform yesterday the crowds parted for him like the Red Sea. If he'd gone for the church he'd have people queuing to see him-'

'Gilbert Blythe was never interested in drawing crowds,' Diana cuts in primly. It's all very well being worldly, but that sort of talk is bordering on Methodist –which reminds her… 'You'll never guess who left the seminary?'

They discuss the broken heart Moody Spurgeon McPherson inflicted on his mother -she had taken to eating her hair!- how Jane got fat after bearing a son for Charlie Sloane, and Josie reed thin since delivering twins.

'They're calling the girls Saphronica and Thisbe Harrison-Pye.'

'Harrison Pye,' says Anne, tasting the words. She thinks of the peacock who once tried to sack her; his creased purple face and gaudy ties. 'Now that's what I call 'just desserts'.'

'Well they certainly deserve each other, if that's what you mean,' Diana agrees, and goes onto describe the house Mrs and Mrs James A. built in a newly developed suburb south of Summerside.

'More gilt and glass you have not seen. Ugly bowed windows and the drapes always open-'

'Well how else are the neighbours going to see their excellent taste?'

'But the fuel costs, Anne! And then there's mean old Charlie Sloane, who keeps half of his house shut up to save him heating the rooms.'

'I suppose a headmaster earns less than a School Inspector.'

'Well they both earn more than a lowly female teacher,' Diana grumbles.

This complaint has nothing to do with pay parity, she is all for men earning more; that way the women can stay at home. But until that happy day Diana is saving every penny. She lives at a boarding house across the road from this tearooms and is saving for a marriage that her parents do not want. The unsuitability of Fred Wright has only grown with each year. Along with the sins of seduction he has two more strikes to his name. His father lost their farm which means the eldest Wright boy is landless, and worse... His mother has Acadian kin; why she offered up a prayer for that Grit Laurier when he practically called for revolt!

Not until they retreat to the boarding house, and Diana's narrow bed, does she open her heart about this. She might be twenty-one but when it comes to her mother she always feels like a child.

'She barely spoke at Sunday luncheon, and when I came back from my walk to say goodbye she wouldn't say it back.'

Anne wraps her arm around her friend and kisses her thick black hair.

'That's what happens when we force people to choose, we end up pushing them in the one direction we don't want them to go.'

As she says this she hugs Diana tighter. Diana gently shifts away.

'Why are you always leaving then, what pushes you?'

'My own stubborn will,' Anne says, smiling. She lifts her head and rests her cheek on her hand. 'But I have no plans to leave this time. I've missed home horribly.'

'I don't know what home you think you're going back to. With Marilla and Martin gone to Sweden-'

'I wanted them to go, Marilla deserves to hold at least one grandchild. Another Soren. That'll be Mrs Lynde's doing, no doubt. She always did like sons to be named for their fathers -or in this case grand-nephews to be named after nephews.'

'Dora declares her next child is be named for her brother whether it's a boy or not-'

 _'Davy?'_ Anne splutters and flops on her pillow. When she touches her cheeks they feel hot.

'What's wrong with that? He's a real naval hero now. Hunting down those opium smugglers-'

'Yes- no- of course, I'm only surprised because... because that means Dora must be expecting again.'

'Didn't you know?'

Anne lets go a sigh. 'It's my fault. They don't know I've left Regina, there's probably a letter there waiting for me. So... another child... I suppose now-'

'Fred says Marilla and Martin won't be home for another year at least. They asked if he would continue to manage the farm till the spring that follows this one.'

'I see,' Anne says, her voice like a bone that had all the marrow sucked out of it.

'Now you know why I wanted to be sure you were staying,' Diana says, running Anne's braid through curled up fingers. It is as heavy as rope in her hand, and thick with the smell of coal smoke and rosemary. 'They say eight thousand took to the streets when that traitor was hanged. They'll be a story there somewhere... for anyone brave enough to hunt it out.'

'I know all about it,' Anne says quickly, 'Gilbert and I talked of little else...' She'd been so angry when they talked -talked?- she'd come very close to shouting. Pouring out her shock and bitterness as she told him all she knew. And he took it, every drop. By the time she left he'd been as angry as she was, fired up with a cause that was not his own. She'd been proud of the fist he struck against the wall, the fire she saw in his eyes. He wasn't really her brother, but when he looked like that she could swear her blood flowed through his veins. When he ran alongside the train he called out, 'If I don't see you this Christmas I'll know where to find you!' Anne knew he meant Quebec.

The next day Diana gives Anne a tour of the new addition to the White Sands school house. A Miss Eloise Andrews (first cousin to Jane) now takes the senior pupils, leaving Miss Barry to dote on her infants. Inside there is a brightly upholstered armchair and a braided rug where the children sit at her feet. Anne smiles when she sees this, but this one is bittersweet, for the school house looks more like a cosy home than a classroom.

'Oh Diana, it's delightful. You'll break your children's hearts when the time comes for you to leave.'

Diana purses her lips, and reminds Anne of Mother Hannah. 'That time is a long way off,' she says.

That afternoon Anne makes her way to Avonlea and her beloved Green Gables. She likes Frederic Wright. They became friends some time ago, when he delivered her mail in hopes that something from Diana might be for him. His brothers live with him and when she finds them in the kitchen shovelling ham hash down their throats, she laughs. They remind her of meal times on the prairie, except the men all stood up when she entered the Mess. Here it's only the Wright boys eyebrows that stand to attention. That canny Anne Shirley came in so quiet even the hound didn't hear it.

'Welcome Anne,' Fred bellows. 'You wanting some tea? Claude make some fresh tea!'

'Just water if you have it,' Anne says, as though this wasn't her home.

She stares hard as the sampler Dora made when she used to live here. Hebrews 6:19 _Hope anchors the soul,_ hanging above the pot stand. She remembers the way Marilla had drawn her fingers over the needlework, reading the length and tension of each stitch as well as any eye. Marilla allowed herself a complacent smile knowing Dora minded what she told her, and Anne saw it in her letters too. They might be written in Dora's hand but they are every inch Marilla. In her last one she said she suited life where it was dark for half the year, and knew the Blomqvist's cottage as well as she knew her own home. She would not know Green Gables now; wet socks hanging from the fire guard, a dog beneath the table, but it makes Anne happy because it feels like a home.

Home. That word would keep haunting her. When she lies in the spare room that night and listens to Fred snore she tries to remember when she last felt safe. And an image -or was it a sound- comes to her: the drip drip drip of the rain that fell inside Riel's cell. Except there was no rain, so what was it, the water that seeped through the rotten walls and pooled on the cold stone floor? He should have been shaking with his shorn head and prisoner's garb; should have shivered, begged, unravelled. Yet he was calm as a pond of ice. He told her he forgave every man that wronged him, but there was one he never mentioned. Anne had written in the margins of her notebook, _Why did you kill that man?_ _Why?_ and in her muddled exhaustion typed it up for the pressman. She wonders if the line ever made it to print. Mr Muir refused to proof-read, his job was to set the story in sixteenth inch type. Like the stitches Marilla taught her girls to make, perfect little letters all in a row...

Then it comes, all the missing Anne never let herself feel seeps into her. If she isn't careful it will leak out her eyes. It looks like home and it smells like home but where was Martin's lamp showing under the door? Or the one in Diana's window? Even the moon hid behind banks of cloud. In the morning she sees it, hanging above the Snow Queen's bare branches, a crescent so fine the sky showed through. Anne doesn't recognise its significance until she squats over her chamber pot and sees the rag in her hand go red. When she should be hunting out her menstrual belt she seeks out the ring Gilbert's mother gave her. An oval of carnelian with bands of white, like the growth rings of a tree. She slips it on and opens the window as the first snows of winter drift down. Catching them in the palm of her hand till her skin goes a mottled blue.

Henri knocks a half hour later, rubbing the reminder Fred kicked into his rump. 'Sorry Anne, I was supposed to tell you there's breakfast if you're wanting it.' He is fairer than Ruby Gillis, his lashes and eyebrows are white.

'You needn't run after me,' she assures him, and roughs up his hair which is soft as snow. On the way down she asks after the Gillis', then carefully brings up Mrs Blythe.

'You can go if you like, you can knock all day, just wear something warm while you do it,' Fred says, 'because Ro Blythe's not answering to anyone.'

Anne suspected as much. When Gilbert said his mother had been keeping to herself she had an instant picture of what he meant. After breakfast she goes knocking, not at the Blythe's door but the little stone cottage that lies behind their orchard.

'Open up Ro Blythe, I know you're there, I can see the smoke from the chimney!' Anne calls.

The curtain twitches then the door swings open. 'So... you're back, are you?' Rowena asks her.

'Yes,' Anne says, and her eyes shine with tears. 'I promise you I'm back.'

...

 _* Acadian refers to people of primarily French descent who settled in Canada from the 17th C (fun fact: in the States they are known as Cajun)_

 _* 'the Grit Laurier' refers to Wilfrid Laurier who would later become Prime Minister. A Grit is a Liberal, you might remember the scene in Anne to the Rescue where she and Matthew discuss a political rally, and Anne says she is glad she is a Conservative because Gilbert is a Grit._

 _* 'Hope anchors the soul' is paraphrasing 'Which hope we have as an anchor...' Hebrews 6:19 KJV_

This was a hard one to write for lots of reasons. I have to go away on Monday and I pushed myself to get this down so you wouldn't have to wait. I was also mindful that I am writing for two different audiences, those who read Anotherlea and those who haven't (who will be wondering how it happened that the Cuthbert's new neighbour came to marry Josie Pye, and how Marilla could have a grandson!) For those who know these characters I hope you enjoyed the catch up. I got the name Saphronica from my research on the editor of The Leader. She was a journalist and his mistress and had two children by him, later she kicked him to the curb.

Bright River: My goodness darling, it's great to hear from you. Your stories inspired me in so many ways. I hope you write more soon!

Kim Blythe: Good to be back, cherie. I wanted to add the French lyrics too but I thought things might feel a bit long. I'm happy to hear you're excited about Davy and Gilbert, the moment he turned up in Anotherlea I knew he had a bigger part to play.

Julie: (looks up Nike of Samothrace) Yes, yes, yes, I was thinking that, yes, of being completely in thrall to the elements, with arms stretched out instead of wings. Thank you for that beautiful image.

wishwars: Woot woot! great to have you on board once again! I hope you enjoy the ride.

PelirrojaBiu: Once again you say everything I never knew I was trying to say. I'm so lucky to have a reader like you. I was fascinated with the Rebellion too, the more I read about Canadian history the more it pulls me in.

Guest: I'm squealing right back. To have a reader who is so excited and understands Anne so well, it's a dream! :op

Catiegirl: Ah, babe, thank you. Your reviews are always so generous and thoughtful. I'm glad you noticed the 'brother' line, but mostly I'm glad this Anne feels like Anne to you.

Regina56: Well this is a first, here I am writing about a place called Regina, and here you are, Regina. Here's something funny, you're not the only one to say they were 'just thinking about Anotherlea' or 'just finished reading Anotherlea' -maybe I sensed something in the wind.

FKAJ: I don't know what to say, you know what your encouragement means to me. I wouldn't be back here without you.

Guest: I hope this chapter lives up to your expectations, thank you for coming along.

elizasky: How do you even have time to review, aren't you neck deep in a zillion stories? I'm so grateful you took the time to read this. The 'sea person' thing was a half formed thought that will come up again later, but it mostly has to do with the story being set in a harbour town. Anne is definitely a forest person, maybe she might go back to her roots. Ok, bad pun.

OriginalMcFishie: I loved what you said about the energy of my Anne. _Loved it_. Thank you!

Meadowlarkflyaway: I hope you're enjoying this story. Please share your 'many thoughts' about Anotherlea too.

ozdiva: Thank you for reviewing so quickly. I am a nervous wreck until that first review comes, it doesn't matter how long I've been doing this, that feeling never goes away. You're lovely.

Thank you everyone for reading, following and faving. To the writers whose stories I have yet to read I am sorry I haven't reciprocated, but I aim to read any new stories you post while I am on here. (Kim, I promise to read all of yours!) I'll be away for a week so I won't have a chance to write the next chapter till February.

Love kwak


	3. A rose by any other name

_**2**_

If Rowena Blythe has reasons to doubt that promise, she soon begins to believe. After a pot of one of Mrs Blythe's 'wild teas' Anne hitches Rebel to the Blythe's painted sleigh and fetches her trunk from Green Gables. Fred is in the yard and gives her a wink, then carries on guiding his wedge through a log. It's clear what she intends to do, no point asking when the shutters on the east gable window need mending. Anne responds with a white-teethed grin. So, the curtains were crooked and the sheets were all blue, the farm and its buildings never looked better. Fred had doubled the potato harvest, tripled the number of ewes, and conjured cream from the cows so thick almost every Avonlea housewife frequented his dairy.

That afternoon Mrs Blythe smears his butter onto a sticky bit of fruit cake. Going by the empty shelves in her pantry she hasn't had guests for a while. The cake is dense with stem ginger and overpowered by cloves –it must be one of Mrs Lynde's. She made the same for Marilla when Matthew died, but that would mean… surely not. Could this cake be eighteen months old?

'It must be,' Rowena muses, and slides back in her chair. 'I haven't baked a thing since John passed. Not even when Gilbert comes home.'

Anne knows why. She can tell by the air in the room, dank with a chill the fire can't touch, that Rowena hasn't lived in the house for some time. No wonder she shut the door to the cottage before Anne could get inside, she must be sleeping in there.

'There's no stove in the cottage, as I recall. What are you living on, fresh air?'

She certainly looks like a sharp cold wind: a mistral dressed in squally greys, her hair an icy white. It was the shock that did it. One Saturday morning two Junes ago John and Gilbert went out to pick early summer beans. Only Gilbert came back, his back bent with the effort of trying to carry his father. They say his mother's hair turned white by Sunday. Straight too, Anne thinks, noticing the way it falls from a centre parting to cover her ears; the only kink in it is the knot at her nape. Those same 'theys' once whispered Mrs Blythe was a witch. No one whispers it now. The hair, the dress, the cat... the only thing missing is the broomstick.

Rowena raises her eyebrows and coughs.

'Very astute, Miss Fontaine, what else have you deduced?'

'That I'm going to have to change my pen name. It seems like everyone knows my secret.'

'I would know if that was the case -don't look at me like that, Anne, I may live like a hermit but I still go to church. If anyone in Avonlea knew the truth you wouldn't have made it as far as Barry's Pond before they set the pitchforks on you.'

'She's not popular then?'

'She has no sympathisers, put it that way,' says Rowena, her papery skin crinkling with a long disused smile. 'Still, it's a shame for all that. A syndicated columnist the likes of yourself should be celebrated not hidden.'

'Is that so, _Doctor_ _Lavendar?_ ' says Anne, archly, referring to the advice column Mrs Blythe writes for the Charlottetown Echo.

Rowena attempts another cough but she isn't be able to hide it this time, and bursts into laughter.

'Confound you, Anne Shirley, there really is no besting you!'

'No, there's not,' Anne agrees. She shuffles off her chair and kneels at Rowena's feet. 'And there's no use in trying. I've had my fill of the Wright boy's ham hash -delightful though it is- so I'm coming to stay with you.'

'Is that why you brought that old trunk?'

Anne nods.

'It has all my worldly possessions,' she quips, 'except one. I left my typewriter with Diana-'

'I don't believe it!'

Anne rocks back on her heels and looks very pleased with herself.

'Miss Fontaine is taking a long vacation -I even heard rumours she might be retiring.'

'Well, she's quite the catch,' Rowena concedes, 'it wouldn't surprise me if she traded her Miss for a Mrs one of these days.'

Anne scoffs in the manner of Marilla -the spinsterish one.

'I doubt that, she's far too much for one man to handle!'

Rowena takes Anne in her arms, but the girl will not be held for long and runs to the porch to retrieve her trunk from the falling snow. A moment later her pointed face appears at the parlour window, one brown finger scratching figures in the frost: a star, a triangle, a crescent, like the patches on her son's quilt. A black tom jumps up on the window ledge and chases Anne's finger, knocking down a photograph and cracking the glass. Rowena picks it up and holds it to her chest; her son in his cap and gown and holding the Cooper Cup.

'That's what I'm afraid of,' she says.

The two women rub along quietly for the first week. Mrs Blythe does not move into the main house and Anne does not ask her to. The door to the bedroom she shared with her husband for twenty three years remains closed. Sometimes Anne would skip past it quickly, certain a scream lay within. She takes over the spare room but often ends up in Gilbert's, mainly due to his desk. While her typewriter might be out of bounds that doesn't stop her wanting to write. Articles for Harper's mostly, but they come out as clever, self-conscious things and always end up mentioning Joe. When that happens she heads out to Lawsons and brings back sacks of flour, almonds, glacé cherries, sugar, raisins, molasses, mace, and starts to bake. The house takes on a plummy smell, the air is no longer dank but spicy, and Rowena finds herself lingering longer after meals. The open fire in the cottage is a fickle thing; the stove cranks out good dry heat and soon the two women are jostling over who will rule the kitchen.

It's a battle Anne is happy to lose, all she wanted was to give Mrs Blythe something to look forward to. Once upon a time she had taught Anne all about feast days; how to live by the moon and sing up the sun, yet she had forgotten the best festival of all. For the rest of December they prepare for Christmas, and talk of little else. A party, yes! For the Wright boys whose folks were in Saint-Quentin, for the Lyndes whose offspring never came home, for the Gillis' and still unmarried Ruby, and for Gilbert. In fact most of the work was for Gilbert, for he was his mother's North Star, but Rowena had made so much food by then she had to invite everyone else.

When she isn't cooking she worries about whether he will be able to cross the Strait, but reports are the ice is solid and regularly taking sleigh boats across. Anne shares Mrs Blythe's relief when they hear this. Yet when they leave Prayer Meeting and head toward home she quietly owns to another feeling, the one she felt when she caught sight of Gilbert at Kingsport station. Part of her feels that same disappointment, when she half hoped Gilbert would not be able to come. The monstrousness within her heart shames her, and she shuts it away, like Rowena's room, and pretends it isn't there.

You wouldn't know it if you saw them together, after spending five straight minutes anchored in his mother's arms, Gilbert spends most of Christmas Eve talking with Anne in the covered porch. Rowena sleeps in there now, and he sits cross legged on the daybed and cradles her pillow on his lap.

'She still not sleeping in her room, I take it?'

Anne huffs. 'Well I had to save one challenge for you!'

For a moment Gilbert thinks about socking Anne on the head with the pillow, but he can't stop fingering the lacework -where has he seen that pattern before? Finally he says, 'You did more than I could.' He doesn't sound sorry for himself, his hazel eyes flick over the girl in the turquoise rocker and he remembers the lace at last. Anne had the same on her drawers.

'True,' she admits, not willing to meet that gaze and closer still to taking the pillow and pummelling him. But she can't, they're not children. Gilbert is a man of twenty-four -how can that be? The death of his father saw the last shreds of boyhood fall from him like leaves from a tree. She always thought of him as evergreen, but, no, he's deciduous like her. This winter he is lean and vigorous when he should have been soft and pale from all those hours in the lecture halls, the lab, the library. Perhaps he carried his library with him, it would explain why his sleeves fit so snug round his arms.

She claps her hands and leaps from the chair. 'Come! Let's light the candles on the fir!'

They avoid each other after that, it's not hard to do, there's so much to get on with before the guests arrive. The Wrights come first, an hour early, not that this worries Rowena, they are like her own sons. They crowd round the table and heap their plate with pies, their own gift pride of place in the centre of the table. A perfect pound of butter, gold with carrot and embossed with the Cuthbert's old butter stamp. The Lynde's arrive promptly, just as they ought to, and the Gillis are late because Ruby had five feet of ribbon to stitch along the hem of her best wool dress.

'It's from China,' she announces, 'Davy Rossi sent it to me,' and she strokes the scarlet silk as though it was his face.

Mrs Lynde's face bulges at such a demonstration, all ready to tell young Ruby that it's rude to boast, or flirt, or whatever she was doing -there was something unwholesome about it. But before the words get out of her mouth it is crammed with the shortbread Anne wafts under her nose. This gives Mrs Gillis the chance to say, 'Davy's very fond of my Ruby. Very,' and nod her head till her wattle wobbles.

She was almost one and twenty, was Ruby, and the fairest girl of all. It had troubled the Gillis' that she hadn't been taken, while plainer girls like Jane and Josie and Dora were already mothers. Luella Gillis took comfort that Ebba's girl, and Marilla's, were also on the shelf. But they weren't pretty like Ruby was pretty, it seemed like such a waste. Till that Davy came on the scene. He made Ensign, too, a proper Officer, no doubt to prove his worth to her darling daughter.

Gilbert hides a smile, or rather it turns into a frown. He recalls a similar ribbon in Anne's hair; and it worries him a little that he knows her wardrobe so well. It comes of hardly seeing her. She lives like a picture in his head, and if she didn't write him many letters he had her accounts in all the papers she wrote for. He wonders sometimes if it's Anne he loves, or if it's Claire Fontaine.

That shameless hussy comes up after pudding as they gather round the piano. After Rachel belts out God Save the Queen, the Wrights counter with À la Claire Fontaine, the French Canadian's _cri de coeur._ Laurent's bright soprano takes the breath from all their chests. Thomas Lynde slinks behind the fir tree and quickly wipes a tear. His wife is not so sentimental but neither is she about to talk politics on the Lord's Birthday. That lady journalist, on the other hand, the one writing them lies in all the papers, there's no harm mentioning her.

'Who's her mother, that's what I'd like to know. What sort of bringing-up did she have to be gallivanting about all over the country like some no good soldier of fortune. And her opinions! Sensationalist muck! She couldn't be Canadian, that's for certain. She's a Yankee, mark my words, stirring up trouble like they always do!'

Fred leans on the piano, his great paw cradling his chin.

'Well, someone has to,' he says darkly. Gilbert knows that tone, and leans against his mother's chair, observing him with interest. 'Women and children were starving out there waiting on McDonald to make good his promise. It's a crime what he did to my people-'

' _Your_ people?' Rachel snaps. 'Fred Wright, you're no more Metsie than my left elbow. Your father's kin hales from Aberdeen and more sensible folk you could not find. Why you want to associate yourself with that rag-tag lot-'

'Métis!' Fred says, interrupting her, 'and there are many of 'em who claim Scottish blood-',

'Yes, but mixed with all that other lot, Indians and French trappers and the like. It's not natural them mingling like that. And neither is this Claire Fontaine. It sends a dangerous message to our girls, they'll grow up thinking they're too good for home when homemaking is the most important job of all. When it boils down to it, be a carter or king, everything a man does he does for the good of his wife and his home.'

Fred winces, he can't argue with that when all he wants is a home with Diana. Still he can't bear this shrew-faced scold to win the day and does the only thing he can think of, and calls on Anne. She's a journalist -not as sensational as Miss Fontaine, but still- her work had taken her as far as Regina, surely she had something to say.

Fred isn't the only one who is curious. All eyes turn to her, if they hadn't already, excepting Ruby, who rolls hers in dramatic fashion.

'What would Anne know about it? Homemaking, what a bore! Give a girl an adventure I say, why should the boys have all the fun, right Anne?'

'I- I-' Anne falters for a moment, knowing she is going to offend someone, just not the someone everyone is expecting. She takes a gulp of warm tea and sets it down carefully. 'Well, I... I really can't fault Mrs Lynde's opinion, what use are our achievements if they don't serve the people we love? For all Riel's radical ways I believe all he wanted was to serve his home.'

The room goes quiet as she speaks which makes the next disruption more jarring, as Fred slams the lid on the piano and orders his brothers into their coats.

'Fred, I didn't mean I agreed with _everything.._.' Anne pleads.

She follows the boys to the door; Mrs Blythe hastening after them, telling them to stay. Fred stops buttoning his coat. He is the same height as Anne, and his brown eyes bore into her, dark with disappointment.

'There are some round here reckoned you were Claire Fontaine and I used to wonder if they were right. But not anymore. That girl is never afraid to speak the truth when she knows it; you're just another mealy-mouthed reporter.'

Anne opens her mouth to explain when Gilbert rushes past and heads out the door.

'Ma, I'm going after him-'

'Gilbert, wait,' Anne cuts in, 'I don't need you to defend me-'

Gilbert halts on the porch and gives her a sideways glance. 'Yes you do,' he says.

It's after midnight when Gilbert returns. Anne leaves a lamp burning right by her door so he would know she was awake. When he tiptoes past she springs out of bed and follows him into his room. It's different with him in it. Before the room was like a painting of itself. Now even the fire in the grate comes alive; faded stripes on the wallpaper shimmer in the light like living things, and the curled up cat deigns to open an eye.

'Fred's fine,' says Gilbert, unravelling his scarf. 'Get some sleep, we can talk in the morning.'

Anne tightens her kimono around herself and perches on the chair near his desk.

'I can't, Gilbert, please hear me out. I swear to you I had no thought of myself when I said what I did. Tell me you don't think that, at least.'

Anne must have been dwelling on this for some time for she has come to a conclusion Gilbert cannot make sense of, and he tells her as much.

'But isn't that what you think? That I deferred to Mrs Lynde in order to protect Claire -I mean me- I mean...' She pauses and rubs her eyes, working her fingers into her sockets so roughly that Gilbert can't help himself, and tugs her hand away.

'Don't do that, you'll damage your corneas-'

'My what?' Anne says, looking up at him. Her hand is still in his.

'You need them to focus,' he says, drily, and squeezes her fingers. 'I wonder though... This might sound strange, but did you- did you suffer any hurt when you were away, because your irises... they're different.'

'I know,' Anne says, and then, 'I did. Just not the hurt you're thinking of.'

Gilbert nods, and lets her go. He thinks about whether he should continue undressing and gets as far as his tie before he senses her close behind him. Fred's right, she really does move like a wind.

'Gil...' she whispers, just as softly, 'could you... could we lie together? You know, like we did in our snow cave?'

'You want to make a snow cave now?'

It's a measure of how much he adores her, because he is this close to hunting out a snow shovel at one o'clock in the morning. Anne shrugs.

'Here will do,' she suggests, and moves nearer his bed. His curtains are open and the black sky that frames her looks like a blackboard. 'Just for a minute... I'm so tired, Gil, and I know I won't be able to sleep.'

He hasn't met this Anne before. The one who worries what he thinks of her and is clearly afraid of her dreams. She looks small and wretched, and he's struck with a memory of the first day they met. He had teased her -about what, her freckles, her hair?- and she whacked him with something or other. The teacher stood her in front of the class and savoured the pleasure of shaming her, but Anne refused to cry. It was five years before Anne forgave him that tease and they've been friends for five more, even lovers for one dreamlike summer. She calls him her brother now. Well, that was her job wasn't it, to make words mean what she wants them to mean? But he never tries to pin her down because you can't pin down the wind.

There's no question of him lying with her, not with Ma in the house; nor is this the right time to bring out his ring. So he does what he wishes he had done back then, when she stood before the class that day. He squares his shoulders and takes a breath and simply stands there with her.

...

 _* the cottage, Doctor Lavendar and the Charlottetown Echo are first mentioned in Anotherlea, as are Gilbert's quilt, bilberries and snow caves. The sleigh boats feature in The Windy Willows Love Letters_

 _* the butter description is from Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House in the Big Woods -in winter they used grated carrot to colour the butter yellow._

 _* Ensign is a Second Lieutenant_

 _* Métis refer to people of predominantly French and Indigenous descent. Riel was Métis._

 _* McDonald was the Conservative Prime Minister of Canada at the time. He ordered the militia into Saskatchewan to take down the North West rebellion._

 _* Mrs Lynde's opinion on homemakers is inspired by a quote from my beloved C.S. Lewis._

 _..._

julie: Hmmm, when readers say there is a lot to unpack I get antsy. I think I posted the last chapter before it was properly ripe, but never mind. I loved what you said about rootlessness; how people are living away and sleeping in different places to what they should be. I remember thinking, Huh, is that what I wrote, clever me! Please keep the artistic analogies going if you can. I am already wondering what you will make of this chapter :o)

Lizzy: hello my dear, thank you so much for reading! I'm so happy you enjoyed 'roving reporter Anne', I feel like I could write a creditable essay on the North West Rebellion now. I think it's time I admitted to myself that my heart lies with historical fiction.

Guest: you and I need to get together and talk third wave feminism -or is it fourth, I lose count. I haven't seen Anne with an E, my feeling is that it's a fanfic, and that's cool, I mean that's what we all write here. But it's someone's version of Anne, it's not Anne. Maybe I should PM you and we can talk 21st C revisionism of 19th C literature -I think you better sign up ;oP

wishwars: a reader after my own heart. Yes Diana was and always will be Anne's first love. I got the idea about Diana becoming a teacher from one tiny line in AoGG about Diana's head always being in books. While she never admitted she wanted to be in the Queen's Class I definitely got that impression, so I thought, Ok honey, let's give you a shot.

Janey: The Cooper Prize goes to you! Yes, Far from the Madding Crowd is the inspiration. Thank you! I was beginning to think no one was going to guess. I'm chuffed you like my stories and even happier that I have managed to lure you from lurk-land. There will be two book binding chaps in Anne's shop that need names soon. Get you thinking cap on because I want you to choose them. They're the peevish, precious sort who are always trying to out do each other, if that helps.

Kim: Yes Jane got fat and Josie got thin. She married my version of James A. Harrison (the deputy school inspector in Anotherlea) because I'm mean like that. Thank you for all your PMs, I have just got back from a trip away and in my spare time I selfishly worked on my story instead of replying to you. But now this is posted I'm on it. I hope Rowena lived up to your expectations, she's had some troubles too, but it won't be all bad, this is an Anne story after all.

Catiegirl: So now you know about the disappointment. No his hair didn't fall out, or his teeth, it's just the usual one step forward one step back dance these two like to do. Talk about get me in the heart by mentioning J.C. -ah! I know this generation will be all about that boy from Anne with an E, but for me the 80's Anne series will always be the defining one. Thank you again, I feel like I posted that chapter a little too soon so I am glad you got so much out of it. (It's since been tweaked because I can never stop tweaking. My stories are like rivers, you never read the same one twice!)

NotMrsRachel: You re-read Anotherlea? I could kiss you! There is no greater compliment, especially considering it's over 100 000 words. Mwa!

eliza: the brainstorming lasted all of three seconds, I was thinking Shakespeare and Thisbe came to mind. I'm afraid when it comes to writing I veer closer to the sadist's corner, but in the case of Mary Vance, I think Maud gave Mary exactly what she wanted, big, brash, look at me, windows. As to GB 'changing sides' maybe it was a case of supporting the person not the party? The world needs more of that, don't you think? :o)

FKAJ: I think the chapter you described is the chapter I wish I had written -lol! When I read your comments I can't help thinking, Who is she taking about, I wanna read her too! You described me as cinematic before and maybe that's it, I see it and then I write what I see. Maybe I should be writing screen plays. I liked the 'leak out the eyes' line too, I actually hopped out of bed and went downstairs and tapped it into my lappy when I thought of it. I could imagine Maud having a good chuckle over that.

Regina: I don't know if I can explain this properly but knowing you loved Anotherlea is different to knowing you love another one of my stories. I love them all, of course, but I think you could say Anotherlea is my Walter -a little more dear to me that it should be. I know it's a strange little story and it went places a lot of Anne readers don't want to go, but I love it for all that, so thank you for telling me you do too.

oz diva: Haha! I knew you'd miss Marilla, but you see, she's had her love story, and besides Anne is about to get up to some very unMarilla-ish things, and she just couldn't do that if Marilla was there. I am catching up on Kim's story but after that I will read yours. Your PM really touched my heart. I look forward to seeing where you took Miss Cuthbert :o)

A Fan: You're welcome so much. Thank you!

...

And thank you to everyone who is reading. I realise a sequel to an AU won't be everyone's cup of tea (except if you read Catiegirl, and let's face it everyone has) but it makes me happy to know you want to come along. I want to do my best for you :o)

The Cooper Prize this time goes to the person who guesses the colour of the stone in Gilbert's ring.


	4. All roads lead

_**3**_

Anne lies in the spare room and listens to the bed springs in Gilbert's bed creak for the hundredth time as he turns for the hundredth time and tries to fall asleep for the hundredth time. Anne is still as still. The spare bed is a good one and barely squeaks at all, yet Anne wills her body not to move lest the man next door realises she can't sleep either. There are pins and needles in her left foot and she slowly raises her knee to her chest and gently flexes her toes. Her kneecap brushes over her mouth and she remembers when she was seventeen and used to kiss her pillow. Tonight, desire burns inside her so brightly she worries it might show under the door; like the lamp she placed on her floor this evening, when she wanted Gilbert to come to her room.

He knew it too, why else would he walk on by, or keep his back to her, or stand mutely by her side? They stood like that for a full minute, Gilbert looking straight ahead, Anne giving him several sideways glances. When that didn't work she cocked her head and asked him what he was doing.

'The only thing I can do,' he muttered quietly –hoarsely, Anne realised, and she quickly bid him good night and retreated to her room.

She knew this would happen, because it always happens. She only has to spend half an hour -sometimes half a second- in his company before she wishes they were lovers again. It won't do- it won't- it won't- and she makes herself get out of bed and write out the reasons why. It's predictable, unimaginative, selfish, impulsive, dangerous, ruinous, impractical, wrong. It's also cold. The fire has gone out because she forgot to bank it and her thin silk kimono is no match for the chill burrowing into her bones. She dives back under the covers again; how good would it feel to slide into bed and nestle into him? She would coil herself around his body like a snake upon a sun warmed stone, and instead of beating at a thousand miles her heart would slow to a steady pulse. Thick and throbbing, hot and low. Safe and sound. Safe and sound...

Afterwards she sleeps with a satisfied smile and the scent of herself on her hand. The mail comes at eight, it is two days late and the occupants of the Blythe house fall upon it the way the Wright boys fall on food. The youngest one turns up just after lunch with more letters for Anne. He finds her curled up in the window seat in the Blythe's poky dining room re-reading her letter from Diana. The Barrys are spending Christmas in Charlottetown with Aunt Josephine, and Diana was laughing because two eligible bachelors were seated at her end of the table.

 _Mr Wilson and Mr Olsen must be thirty by now, I wonder why they haven't been snapped up? There was another gentleman, a Mr Baron, but he stayed at Aunt Jo's elbow all evening and did nothing but sip and chew. Wasn't I relieved? He must be forty, why that's almost as old as Papa! Imagine kissing someone as ancient as that!_

Anne's imaginings are rudely interrupted by a bunch of envelopes thrust at her from a small hand pink with chilblains.

'Thank you, Laurie, tell Fred thank you, too,' she says, kindly. 'Will you all come for supper tonight? Mrs Blythe says there's so much left over and I'd love to hear you sing again.'

Laurent shrugs, awkwardly, and stuffs his hands in his pockets.

'Are your fingers sore, darling? I know a good remedy for that-'

'I was thinking the same,' Rowena cuts in. In one hand she has some sliced raw potato. The other hand reaches for the boy.

'I don't haffta eat it, do I?' he asks her as she leads him out of the room.

Anne tears into Marilla's envelope next, inside is a generous letter strewn with misspelled asides from Martin and ending with a five page post script from Dora. Soren had made Marilla some sort of contraption to help her get round when the snow was too deep for her cane. Instead of wheels it had runners. Martin wanted to put a cow bell on it too, and Marilla had told him if he liked cows so much he could sleep in the barn from now on. It looked like little Soren's nickname would stick, because even his sensible mama had taken to calling him Snuffe. And Soren's sister, Sigrid, feels sure Dora is having a girl because she hung her wedding band over Dora's belly and it swung in a circle, or was it back and forth?

'At least it isn't twins,' Anne murmurs to herself as she holds Davy's envelope up to the light. He sometimes tucks in little keepsakes with his letters; a shark's tooth, a gaudy trinket, a coin with a hole in it. This time it's a tiny porcelain hand. It must have come from a doll or a puppet. The surface is crazed with fine blueish lines and beneath Anne can make out fingernails no bigger than flakes of salt. In the letter that came with it he had scrawled:

 _If someone asks for your hand now Anne, you can give the fellow this._

Anne laughs again, a little louder this time and draws Gilbert into the room. He's wearing the light grey sweater his mother made him for Christmas. The cuffs of his white shirt poke out from his sleeves and he still hasn't put on a tie. He's not wearing any hair oil either. It makes him look younger, cheekier -and the look in his eyes doesn't help.

'I'm glad your mail is funnier than mine.'

'Why, what did you get?' Anne asks.

She shifts over to make space for him on the window seat. Gilbert prefers to stand.

'End of term grades, mostly. An A- for anatomy.'

Anne's eyes are suitably mocking but she soon turns red as she blurts, 'Well, what do they say, practice makes perfect! Ah- what's that?' she adds, quickly, pointing to the paper under Gilbert's arm.

'A chum from Redmond sent a copy of the Daily News. I wrote something for them a while back-'

'But you're not a journalist, you work in the printing room-'

'Don't worry, nothing I write will ever compare to the mighty Fontaine.'

'I wouldn't mind if it did. Perhaps then I'd stop getting so many of these.' Anne gestures to the envelopes on the dining table. 'Davan wants to know if I'm bored yet, Oliver wants to know if I'll come back to the Echo-'

Gilbert sits down close beside her. Her stocking-toes touch his hip and they both recoil as though one had burned the other.

'And _are_ you, _will_ you?' he says at last.

Anne blinks as if bringing herself back from a dream. She smiles, a brief one, and tucks Davy's gift in the pocket of her sweater.

'You already know the answer to that. I don't want to be Claire Fontaine anymore. It's not because of what happened last night. I'm used to that -but that's the thing. I don't want to be, Gilbert. I pretend to be Claire. Claire pretends to be a beggar, an opium addict, an unwed mother, a nun...' the last one said so softly, Gilbert leans in closer still. 'I've been wondering whether, if I had to do it all again, I would have taken a position on a newspaper staff. It used to be a dream of my childhood that I would some day become a writer -a great writer- and astonish the world with my work. Instead I've become too adept at deceit-'

'No,' says Gilbert, drawing back. 'I won't let that stand. What you do is tell the truth whatever it might cost you. Your reporting has real consequences, Anne, you got that baby seller arrested, that Dame school shut down. You spoke to Riel! You were with him at the end...'

Anne pulls her knees to her chest as he speaks, and draws her finger along the condensation on the window. She is thinking of Joe again; how when they ran out of paper she would huff on her mirror and teach him to write letters on the cloudy glass. And she left him behind. She put ten dollars in his boot instead of saying goodbye.

'You know what did it for me, when I knew I'd had enough? It was when Riel recognised me from the courthouse. That was my job in Regina, when I wasn't off in Batoche I was the local court reporter. It was Davan's idea, you wouldn't believe how many deals take place under the nose of a judge. He hid me in plain sight, had me dress in drab colours, keep my head down. I worked there for eight months on and off, and I don't think anyone called me anything but Davan's girl or Miss. But Riel knew me. It was his last day living and I turned up in his cell in a mouldy robe, and he knew me, Gilbert. He knew my face- my name- and I was... I know this will sound crazy but I was grateful, because I knew I wouldn't have to lie to him.'

Rowena has been standing in the doorway for some time. She thought perhaps the two might have been talking on something other than work. But if Anne was going to talk about Riel, Rowena was going to listen.

'Was it is bad as you said it was, Anne -or was that just for the papers?'

'It was worse. Extreme poverty. Magnificent dignity -but I was never allowed to write about that. Davan had no love for Riel, he wanted him to hang, just like most of the editors I wrote for. Half the time my articles were reworded and changed around. Small papers rely on the government for printing contracts and advertising, they're not about to bite the hand that feeds-'

'Unless the story is so sensational the sales it brings is worth the consequence.'

Anne smiles at Gilbert, grimly. 'Of course you know all about it, working at the Daily News.'

'I'm stuck in the basement mostly, helping out the pressman, but I caught on pretty quick,' Gilbert says, rubbing his ear in memory of the cuff he caught, when he asked why their paper was printing a misleading headline.

'So...' says Rowena, with growing impatience, 'you still haven't told me what it was like out west.'

She sits down at the dining table. Gilbert leaves the window seat and goes to stoke the fire. He spots Laurent in the hallway with slices of potato bound to his fingers and beckons him in with a wink. Anne pulls her knees closer to herself; the mist on the glass is starting to cry.

'Like a beauty I have never known. On the Island my eye falls on the tiniest things, a curled up fern, a blossom bud, the red dust that settles on my skin after a gale. On the prairies everything is so vast; the sky, the plain, the river, the stars. Here I feel God's love for the world, out there I felt his power.'

'John often said the same,' Rowena says. She looks at her son who is lying on the rug and setting up a chess board on the floor. The fire sizzles with the discarded potato Laurent has thrown into it, as he settles down to play. She clicks her tongue and tidies the letters strewn upon the table. 'He used to say how small he felt on the prairies, yet at the same time, how free. When Gil came back he was as wild as a little Indian boy.'

'I _am_ a little Indian boy,' Gilbert interjects, 'coming back here didn't make me forget that.'

Anne starts. Though his head is down and focused on his game, something in Gilbert's tone reminds of her the day they met at Kingsport Station. He'd been so angry, a pompous old porter ordered him to leave the waiting room lest he cause the ladies to faint.

'I'm sure it hasn't changed that much since you lived out there with your father, Gil. Of course now the railway's finished the old way of life will change forever.'

'The old way of life went long before that, went with the last of the buffalo-'

'For the Cree, perhaps, but the Métis know how to work the land-'

Laurent's ears prick on hearing that word and he sits high like a hare on a hill. 'Then why'd the government kick 'em out when they promised they could stay? Fred says there were some folks who'd been farming out there for years.'

'Because other people were coming to make a life out there, Laurie, people like your pa and your ma. The government made them promises, too.'

'But that's not fair!'

'No, it's not,' Anne agrees. 'That's what a rebellion is, when a lot of people come together to say it isn't fair.'

'And a lot of people die,' Gilbert mutters. His anger cannot be disguised this time, and he leaps to his feet and stalks out of the room.

'Where's he goin'?' Laurent says, sucking on a chess piece.

'To fix some food for you, I hope,' Rowena replies.

She sounds cheery enough but Anne knows this conversation is a long way from being over. In the space between their duties and rest they talk about life on the prairies. Rowena is particularly interested in how a single female like herself managed life out there without getting murdered or worse.

'You won't scoff, I think, if I tell you that the way to go about it is to watch how the animals live: study the one that seems most like you and take care to live your own life that way.'

'And what animal are you, then? Some sort of bird, I imagine.'

'No, I- no,' Anne says, silenced for a moment. So, Mrs Blythe thought she was a bird? 'Birds could afford to be sillier than I could. If anything spooks them they can always fly away. I studied the foxes, the way they blended into the grassland and risked roaming far from the home. No matter where they wandered they were always primed for escape. They knew which way was the safe way to go, which holes lead to their dens. When they ran, they ran with all their heart and never stopped and never looked back.'

'And where did you find your den?'

'I wish I could say with the paper, but the people I felt closest to were Mother Hannah's order of St John.'

'Catholics?'

'Church of England.'

'Hmm... never had much time for them. Always felt that branch of the church tried too hard to please everyone else without standing for much themselves.'

'I'd like to hear you say that to Mother Hannah, she'd soon set you to rights!' Anne smiles and claps her hands together, imagining the great debates Hannah and Rowena would have. For all their differences they both yearned to serve. Hannah with her bible and her crisp rolls of crepe. Rowena with her brews and her remedy book.

'You keep talking like that and I'll lose my mother next,' Gilbert says when they head out to the stream the following week.

He had been gone for four days, setting traps with Fred and Ephraim. Anne was glad to see him go. It was getting so warm in the Blythe's little house she had gone back to sleeping in nothing again. Diana is returning on New Years Day and Anne plans to stay with the Barrys then. School resumes on the 5th and Diana is fizzing with the idea of Anne teaching with her. Miss Andrews is set to become Mrs White in April. How splendid if the two friends could teach side by side! The plan has its merits but Anne can't think about teaching right now, not when Gilbert says something like that.

'Your mother would never leave Avonlea -though I can see why she might. With Fletchers taking over the farm, you away at school, and your father...'

'She always regretted not going with him to Alberta. He loved it out there, Anne. Sometimes the place we are born in never quite feels like home. But when he was out on the prairies he felt it, like he belonged out west. I know Ma blames herself for wanting him to come back to the Island-'

'And I'd blame her if she didn't, because then I'd never know you.'

Gilbert stops and takes off his hat, scruffing up curls that are damp with sweat. 'True... If I stayed in Alberta you'd probably be married to Charlie by now.'

'Mean-spirited fustilugs! What about Jane? Would you rob her of her grand romance?'

'Maybe she'd decide to head out west, marry some millionaire-'

'Or you-'

'Hey,' he says, eyes flashing. 'Who said I couldn't be that millionaire?'

'I do,' Anne tells him. 'I know you. The moment you become a doctor you'll set up practice in the slums of Kingsport and fight the noble fight against ignorance and smallpox.'

'Hmm, I don't much like the sound of him. Seems like a bit of a prig.'

'You have a curious idea of pigs-'

'A prig,' he says, grinning at her. 'Your vocabulary seems to have shrunk since you roughed it out on the prairie.'

'I'll shrink you!' Anne snaps, her hands on her hips and grinning right back.

'You been peeking in Ma's spell book again?'

He cocks a snoot and starts off at a pace, strutting down the track he made earlier with the boys. Anne marches behind him. She's beginning to regret burning her jodhpurs. Her woollen skirts weigh her down and make every step twice as hard, but it's good to work her body again. They reach a line of poplars, and are heaving clouds of breath when a banging noise fills the air followed by a sharp, brief squeal.

'Muskrat! Come on!' says Gilbert, and he picks his way down the ravine to the frozen stream below.

Anne knows the place well. She almost froze to death right on there on the ice. On the bank that summer she and Gilbert shared their very first kiss. When she gets to the bottom she is expecting to see a muskrat hanging limply from Gilbert's hand, and her heart beats even faster. Despite tagging along this afternoon Anne did not hold with hunting. Matthew never would, not even mice. When they got too bad he would borrow the Pye's terrier rather than set a trap. She couldn't convince Gilbert, however. To him a farmer is worse than a hunter. The farmer tricks his animals into trusting him; the hunter's motives are always clear.

'What? What is it, Gil, it is hurt?'

Gilbert keeps his back to her. He always uses box traps, unlike spring traps or guns it leaves the pelts whole and unmarked. It also means he can free his catch if he needs to; breeding females, pups or kits. Of course he has to kill them, but the look on his face when he looks back at Anne tells her he's not sure if he can.

Anne crouches down and nudges him aside. Inside is a fox bearing needle fine teeth.

'You wouldn't-' she utters, and falls hard on the ice, her hands and feet desperate for purchase as she clambers her way to the snowy bank.

Gilbert doesn't know if Anne is addressing him or the fox. What he does is launch himself, covering Anne with his body. It's a moment of instinct as hard to explain as why he dared to ask her here; why she dared to come. He can feel her chest rise up and down through the bulky weight of their coats. See her eyes, and the pupils within her eyes, widen, deepen and stare. There's a snowflake on her nose and he guides it away with a hot low breath. Within seconds her frantic hands tug at his buttons. Within minutes he's moving inside her.

...

 _* Mr Olsen and Mr Wilson, Mr Oliver, sleeping naked, Gilbert being of Indigenous descent, Rowena's remedy book, and the stream where they kissed, all feature in Anotherlea_

 _* when I use the phrase little Indian boy, I do so for the sake of the period and mean no offense._

 _* to cock a snoot is to put your thumb to your nose and waggle your fingers._

 _* Anne's line, 'I've been wondering whether, if I had to do it again...' is from a journalist who called herself 'A Girl Reporter' and was working at the time of Nellie Bly._

 _Here's what the Smithsoniandotcom said about such women~_

 _'Many of the brightest women frequently disguised their identity, not under one non de plume but many. They went undercover to reveal institutionalised urban ills: unsafe factories, child labour, unscrupulous doctors, scams and cheats. In first person, that stretched over weeks like serialised novels, the heroines offered a vision of womanhood that hadn't appeared before -brave, charming, fiercely independent, professional, ambitious and unabashedly female.'_

 _I read that and I knew Anne Shirley would have made a wonderful journalist. But it was A Girl Reporter's quote about the way deceit wears you down that got me thinking of a way into this new story._

 _..._

julie: So perfect, thank you! That's definitely Rachel dressed in blue with a fab fur hat. But who on earth is the figure behind, are they hands coming out of his hat? How funny, it reminds me of Davy's gift to Anne. I don't know who Anne might be but the figure with the cup and the bowl and what looks like a golden penis -gotta be Gilbert, right? ;oP Oh yeah, the stamp was two swans with their necks entwined. I dunno why...

Guest: So you know Bright Star? That's one of my all time favourite films. Ah, John Keats. 'I did not know how tightly he had wound himself around my heart.'

Pelirroja: Pardon me, but the girl's pic I used in Anotherlea is as brown as a piece of toast irl. Whole wheat toast, but still! I'm glad you find it fun, PB, because it flies out of my fingers like little sparks of joy. Third person perspective is a bloody riot. I especially liked what you said about Anne and Gilbert. It's hard writing characters that DON'T know what to do. But they've done it now...

Regina: I love your reasoning, I shall have to write another story now so I can use that beautiful idea :o)

wishwars: I hope you worked out why Anne sometimes wishes she didn't have to see Gilbert. I never meant to make my meaning so opaque. Thank you for telling me when I could be clearer, it helps a lot.

NotMrsRachel: You are the first to guess correctly! If you like you can choose the name of Will Baron's manor. I'll need it in a couple of weeks.

Original McFishie: I love that you can smell this, that is the best comment yet!

J: The sleeve line was just for you, and you know it!

Erika: Indecisive? No! I wanted them impulsive rather than wishy washy. Thanks for letting me know you're still here, it's amazing to know you're reading after all this time.

elizasky: I only meant deciduous in its most basic meaning: the shedding of things we no longer need. But that doesn't mean Anne is right. I'm pretty sure most of your questions come of me trying to say what I want to say in as few words as possible. I'm finding out that sometimes more is more :oP

If you're still reading, thank you, it means more than I can say. No, you don't have to read Far from the Madding Crowd to understand this, just listen to The Shipping News. When you work out who's the whistle, who's the bodhrán, who's the harp, and who's the strings, you'll know all you need to know.

love kwak


	5. Of night and light and the half light

_**4**_

She imagined this moment would be something akin to the time they cut their thumbs. They would press their bodies close together, join, exchange, expand, renew. Then it would be over, and replete and happy they would brush the snow from their hair and their coats, and half-walk, half-float back home.

Not until he enters her does she realise how hollow she has become. When he pulls back she misses him immediately and grips hard on his shoulders urging him to return. He does it a second time, a third, hips pulling away, coming back, till she understands this is just like breathing. Her hands dare to loosen their hold as she begins to believe he will always return. Just to be sure she wraps her legs around him and he sucks in a breath and bites his lip. The look on his face is something like pain and he tells her needs to stop for a moment.

When she thinks about it later she thinks about this most, when they lay as close as two people can be, and didn't move -except for his eyes which roamed in amazement all over her face. It might have been a trick of the light but Anne's eyes seemed grey, even silver, and they smiled at him even if her mouth did not. He realised he had forgotten to kiss her; all that haste, all those buttons, their gloves, her skirt, and the other layers in between. He's got her now. His Anne. Anne Shirley. And slowly, almost tenderly -for he's still new to this and as out of his body as he is within hers- he begins to move again.

She reaches her hands around her head like a child's picture of a tree, and he cups them with his own so that she doesn't feel the cold. He leaves her, he returns to her, till a friction seems to build and they get so heated and feverish they pull at their scarves and their hats. He has pressed her so deeply into the snow it settles high round her shoulders. Anne yelps as it falls into her collar. Gilbert sucks it away with his lovely warm mouth.

'I want to marry you,' he tells her.

'I know you do,' Anne says, and kisses his curly damp head.

This isn't the response he is expecting, but then that was Anne. He buries his doubt with another thrust and decides to try again.

'Tell me you want to marry me, too.'

'Shhh…' Anne utters, slipping her hands down his back and pressing him into her.

He tilts his head sideways and considers her once more. Anne's eyes are closed, her mouth half open, and he watches the place where her pulse throbs quickening, as she lengthens her willowy neck. He retreats, he returns, retreats and returns, but he can't get the niggle out of his head. His ring is in his coat pocket inside a little leather pouch. Today is New Year's Eve and he is here for one reason and that's to propose. He had meant to build her a snow cave, get down on one knee and give her his ring set with an almandine the colour of blood. If he could just reach... if he could get to it... But Gilbert would rather pull out his own teeth than pull away from her body. He fumbles inside the lining of his coat. Finally he tears it off. Anne lies beneath him bemused.

'Are you hot?' she asks.

'We're doing this the wrong way round,' he explains, 'but then we always do.' He lowers himself onto her again with unconcealed delight. With the coat gone he sinks deeper still, and his voice is raw with feeling. 'I got this for you.'

Anne won't look at the pouch in his hand, instead she gives him a kiss. 'You've already given me everything, Gilbert.'

'Open it-'

'I don't need-.'

'Open it, please, I got it for you-'

'Why?'

'Because I love you and you love me and you're going to be my wife…'

At the sound of that word her eyebrows tilt inward and a crease appears between them; unwanted, portentous, like the snake between Adam and Eve. If Anne always thinks of that moment of stillness, Gilbert can never forget that frown. His heart is already cracked but the uneasy look on Anne's face breaks it open completely. Part of him always knew she is never going to be his wife. She wasn't the wind but a star; bright, beautiful, otherworldly and completely out of his realm. He wanted to turn back time, go back to the moment before he fell on her and snap that fox's neck. To his shame he feels himself soften and he slips out of her and turns away.

'Gil- what is it?' He looks at the pouch and asks her to open it one last time. 'We can't marry, Gilbert.'

'Why the hell not?'

Anne presses her lips against a terrible truth, one that never required a list.

'Because I'd make a terrible doctor's wife.'

Gilbert leaps up and yanks his trousers up with him, then shakes his coat of all the snow. He can hear Anne fuss with her underclothes and he keeps his back to her till he knows she's fully dressed. She doesn't wait for him to turn, she never could, and darts in front of him, attempting a smile. He walks away, almost slips, then marches back so close their boots touch. His chest rises and falls and his jaw is set. Anne begins to feel afraid of what he might do. Not to her, but to them.

'Is that supposed to be a joke?'

'No, Gilbert, please. I'm very serious-'

'So you'll _lie_ with me but you won't marry me?'

'I never thought-'

'You never _thought?_ Have you had other lovers?'

'How can you ask me that!'

'No, I- that was wrong, I just don't understand. How can this be enough for you, how could you let me love you like that if you didn't want me for your own?'

'What has one to do with the other?'

'They have _everything_ to do with each other! I waited for you, for years because I only wanted you. All that time you were away I never pushed and I never asked. You said you were coming home. _You_ said it. Not once but many times. What was I supposed to think?'

'You're like a brother to me-'

'Don't you dare, not after what we've just done.'

'I'm sorry Gilbert, forgive me if I say stupid things, my brain has gone to pieces.'

'Like my heart.'

He says this stiffly as if he is embarrassed to admit it. Anne had encouraged him to become a doctor, then used it as the reason not to marry him. How did she see him, living nobly in the slums, while she wanted to roam the world? As he walks away from her he can picture a trail of blood in the snow.

'Don't go, Gil- please... what- what will we tell your mother?'

'Don't worry yourself,' he calls back. 'I doubt she'll be surprised.'

Spying the leather pouch in the snow Anne picks it up and throws it at him. It strikes Gilbert square on the head but he doesn't turn around. At the top of the ravine he listens for her footsteps. It's so quiet he can hear his heart in his throat. The trap is empty, the fox is gone and Anne is slumped like a rock in the snow. She keeps her back to him, her voice bereft.

'You're leaving me here?'

'I'm sure you can find your way home,' he says.

There's nowhere for Gilbert to go but perdition. He can't cross the road and head to Yellow Birches because that's now owned by an Andrews. He can't go to his mother's because she'll only have to look at him to know what he's done. There's no way he's going to Ruby's New Year's party, and there's no point knocking on Tommy or Ephraim's doors because they'll all be there. It's an eery feeling walking through Avonlea and feeling like a stranger. For the first time he understands how his Ma must feel, when every tree and path she sees reminds her of a ghost.

Still he walks and the further he goes the closer he gets to some sort of hell. By the time he reaches the old pine on Newbridge Road Gilbert feels as though he has left the second circle and gone straight to the ninth. He can scarcely swallow for the loathing he feels, even his spit makes him want to spit. The last thing he wants is to enter Anne's home. He thanks God for small mercies when he finds Fred in the barn as he arrives at Green Gables at twilight. He's got his saw with him and is making a hole. He wants a small stove in there to keep the cows happy. When Gilbert watches him slot the stove pipe into the wall he almost wants to walk out again.

'Hey Gil, grab hold of this will you -I need to feed it through the other side.'

Within minutes the deed is done and a little while later the two men sit before the fire. Fred yanks down his overalls and peels off one of his sweaters. The brass buckles on his bib glint in the light like little bits of gold. Gilbert is content to keep his coat on. He must be really cold because it looks like he's shaking. His eyes are misted over, even his voice is cool.

'You're sure this is safe, lighting a fire in a barn full of hay?'

'As safe as the fires inside that house, and you don't see that burning down, do you?'

'If it was I might walk right in it.'

Fred grins, he knows that feeling; there's nothing he wouldn't do for Diana. 'Anne ain't in there, you know. I thought she was staying with you.'

Gilbert recrosses his ankles and stares hard at the coppery flames. 'About that... I wondered if I might stay with you tonight? The barn'd do-'

Fred leaps up and claps his chum's back. 'Why you little- did your Ma catch you in Anne's room? You are one lucky son of a gun. I mean she's not my idea of a good catch, but so long as you're happy... Say, you checked the traps yet? Reckon we should wait a few days when a little more snow starts to fall. I'm starting to think those muskies must recognise my bootprints.'

'I wish you'd told me that this morning.'

'Why, you been down there already... Not with Anne?'

Gilbert doesn't move, nor show one sign he's heard; just keeps staring at the flames. Fred screws up his eyes and studies his friend. He really did look like he'd like to get in that fire.

'You never spoke, did you, you wouldn't do something as tomfool as that?' He stands himself in front of the stove and kicks Gilbert's boot.

'What?' Gilbert snaps, 'what if I did?'

Fred whistles, a low one, and scratches his sandy brown hair. 'Listen Gil, I know you have it bad for her but you can't go about proposing marriage when you've got nothing to give. What were you expecting, that she would just wait for you to finish school, with nowhere to live, nothing to live on? What if- pardon my French- but what if you got her in the family way? What would you plan on doing then, you'd have to give up medical school, to do what? You're no farmer, and teachers make pittance-'

'Again, I wish you'd told me this this morning.'

His face is white to the roots and so angry Fred finds himself fixing his feet to the stone floor in case a fist flies next. When it doesn't come he dares to come closer and crouches down next to the forlorn man perched on a sack of seed.

'I never knew you to be that hot headed, it's usually me that goes off. You were always the sensible one-'

'Noble too. Don't forget that.'

Fred's not exactly sure what Gil means by that, but it wouldn't be the first time. He stands up and stokes a fire that does not need stoking. There's something else he's been dying to ask and he may as well ask it now.

'What about that letter- the one from Redmond?'

This gets Gilbert's attention. His head jerks up and something like a smile stretches his lips.

'You mean from the Dean, what can I do? Go back and see what he has to say.'

'I don't like it. A man's got a right to his opinion, you should be able to write what you want in a paper.'

'Not if you're the Cooper Prize winner, you don't. The gentleman who gifted that scholarship isn't looking to give it to some 'anti-government agitator'.'

Fred whistles again and asks what Gilbert intends to do. Such is the rarity of his friend's response that later he'll look in his Almanac and check for a Blue Moon. Gilbert sucks on his lip like he was trying not to cry and looks like a man going down.

'You seem to have all the answers, Fred, why don't you tell me.'

Anne Shirley is just as undone, and drifts onto the Barry's porch like an untethered boat. The party at the Gillis' stretched her to her utmost and she left Ruby's bed at dawn and walked to Orchard Slope. She would rather curl up on the frosted swing seat then spend another minute listening to her old friend go on and on about boys. One boy in particular. Not for the first time she envies Davy his chance to live at sea. A ship carries its anchor with it. Anne feels weightless, rootless, with nothing to hold her down.

By midday the jingle of the Barry's sleigh warns Anne of their arrival, and she licks her lips and pinches her cheeks and plasters on her brightest smile.

'Oh Anne, happy New Year, darling. But I never expected you till supper- what is it, you don't look well, are you sickening for something?'

'She better not give it to me!' Minnie-May announces, proud in her brand new fur trim cloak. She lifts her nose so high it looks like someone hooked it and gave it a tug. She blames Anne for taking her sister away by encouraging her to teach. Minnie-May learned early to be politic in her disdain; Aunt Jo wouldn't tolerate her sass for a minute, and Mamma pretends not to notice.

The latter gives Anne a harried look and ushers her inside. 'Don't tell me you've been sitting on that icy porch all day? Sometimes, Anne, you act positively wild.'

Anne decides it might be wise to play invalid for a while. A quiet bed and some warm tea are exactly what she needs. She sleeps till supper in the spare room. Diana doesn't come till the clock on the wall says seven. The genuine Bavarian cuckoo clock has been replaced by something much plainer -and the mahogany dresser with the ivory handles is gone. Diana looks splendid, however, decked out in an inky velvet embroidered with golden thread. At her lapel is a wooden brooch carved with a heart, like the one on a certain willow tree. A Christmas gift from Fred, no doubt. Anne had given Gilbert a pen.

'You're not too hot, nor all that pale,' says Diana, imagining herself Nurse Nightingale, 'but something's wrong, I know it.'

'I hope I'm not causing too much trouble. Your mother looks a little pinched.'

'Don't mind her, it's Aunt Jo made her cross. She usually gives father a cheque for Christmas. This time she bought us extravagant gifts.'

Anne can't see why that should be such a misfortune, but as long as she isn't expected to sit with rest of the Barrys in the parlour she's not about to dig. Relief washes over her, as though she has finally found her way to shore.

'Oh Di, hold me tight and don't let go.'

'Sweetheart, what's happened? When I saw you last in White Sands you looked... well you looked...' It now occurs to Diana just what Anne looked just like: a tinted photograph, the colours painted on not all the way through. 'You tell me all about it,' she starts again, 'then I'll march over to whoever hurt my girl and give them what for!'

'It's pitch black out there,' Anne says weakly, 'your mother would never allow it.'

'True,' Diana says, happy to have some sense come out of Anne at last. 'Perhaps you won't mind if I postpone till morning. I'm not like you, I wouldn't have the first clue how to find my way in the dark.'

'I wish I was a little more like you-' Anne says softly, and lies her head on Diana's lap. By the time she's told her everything the gold embroidered skirts are silvered with snot and tears. Though Diana might wish for her apron she doesn't say a word; at first because Anne clearly needs to talk, and then because she is so... confused- shocked- curious... Diana really has no words.

'Di?' Anne croaks, 'Diana, please say something...'

'Hmm- ah- well... when you say made love, Anne, what exactly do you mean? Are you saying you embraced, that he kissed you and you kissed him back-'

'I just wanted to be close to him, the way we used to be-'

'But you were a child then, you're a woman now. Of course he was going to think-'

'I know- I know- Your mother's right. I'm wild, Diana. There's no way we can marry, surely you see that.'

Diana certainly can. She and Fred were of one mind on everything -you had to be when the whole world was against you. Still, there is nothing wrong with a long engagement and she tells Anne so.

'It isn't that. It isn't. I would wait for him if I knew in my heart it was right.'

'And it isn't right?'

'Can you picture me a doctor's wife?'

Diana thinks of Mrs Dr Spencer and Mrs Dr Blair. Minnie-May calls them the ferret and the screech owl: one with her nose in everyone's business, the other blabbing about it. The airs they put on because they tagged along to some symposium, or met the Premiere, and got their dresses made in Charlottetown. No wonder so many folks slunk off to Mrs Blythe.

'I take your point, but you never let other people's expectations shrink you before. If Gilbert thinks you're good enough-'

'But he wouldn't just be marrying me, he'd me marrying Claire Fontaine, and you know what people think about her. The truth is bound to come out sooner or later because the truth always does. What do you think it will do to him, a young man starting out? He hated seeing his mother endure all that gossip, I couldn't let him go through that again-'

'So you _do_ love him?'

'But of course I do, what did you think?'

Diana shifts Anne's head from her lap and sidles next to her. She thinks of Fred killing himself with work trying to get his own farm. Her mother snubbing her because she didn't want a teacher for a daughter. How Gilbert chose Kingsport over Avonlea, and Anne chose to write and be damned.

'I think following your dreams is a lot more complicated than we ever imagined it would be.'

'I think, Diana Barry, you have never said a truer thing.'

...

 _* chapter title from Aedh Wishes for Cloths of Heaven by Yeats. It's the one about 'treading softly because you tread on my dreams.'  
_

 _* an almandine is a type of garnet ranging in colour from scarlet to black-red. John Keats (the poet not the character) gave Fanny Brawne an almandine ring_

 _* the nine circles of hell are from Dante's Inferno. The 2nd circle is lust, the 9th is betrayal of self or others_

 _* Cutting their thumbs, Yellow Birches, the old pine, and the heart carved into the willow tree are from Anotherlea_

 _* I swiped a couple of lines from A Room with a View by E.M. Foster just because I can :oP_

...

wishwars: I know what you mean, that was my favourite part too :o)

Janey: we are kindred spirits, there is no way I'm not going to love whatever you decide. Please feel free to PM whenever you're ready. I'm sorry for the blindside, I am not a fan of shock for shock's sake (you should have seen my face when Luke threw his light sabre away in The Last Jedi -I'm still spewing!)

eliza: I'm chuffed you liked the fox idea. I expected to write about Anne in a snow cave, then I saw that fox in the trap and realised it said everything I wanted to say. You're harder on Anne than I am, she's being a little disingenuous (dare I say foxy) but you know, "character arc" ;o)

Catie: thank you for mentioning the other characters. I know some readers are disappointed by their absence, that's what you read a sequel for, to catch up with old friends. Speaking of, you remind me of my darling Diana the way you worry over Anne, you really are a beautiful soul. Thank you for being so forebearing about the cliffie, you know and I know how hard that is ;oP

Guest: Ta for the recommend, though I realise the irony because I pointed it out myself. If anyone cares to know I don't watch a lot of tv. I have never seen Breaking Bad or Downton Abbey or Game of Thrones or The Queen or The Sopranos or The Walking Dead (you get the picture). If I have the time I watch/ listen to people making their own content on YouTube, Vimeo, podcasts etc but mostly I read and I write.

EclecticMayhem: what a gorgeous comment; the colour suggestions, the beautiful way you describe it, I was transfixed as I read it. Thank you!

Lizzy: I was the same, constantly dithering over will they/ won't they (J will attest to this because I run a lot of ideas past her, and trust her to tell me when something's sh*t or when I'm being a chicken) Part of me was sorry about the sex until I realised it wasn't my sorrow it was theirs. I knew then it couldn't be any other way. This chapter however, the first bit, wrecked me. How do you write that kind of thing all the time, Lizzy? You're a bloody legend.

julie: I have never been to Montana but I have been to Hay in NSW and it's one of the flattest (and one of my favourite) places in the world. I'm sorry about Rowena, if you're familiar with FFTMC you'll understand why it had to be. And thank you for The Fox Hunt, I would have that for my cover art if I could. It's the most perfect thing I have seen and brought me to that sublime moment of 'arresting strangeness'; when you see the world anew. Thank you, love.

Regina: believe me, neither did I. I'm what you call a 'pantser' meaning I write from the seat of my pants. But I prefer 'gardener' because every chapter is like an off shoot of the last. What this means is that while I have a basic idea of what I want to do, in terms of what seeds I plant, what boundaries I am working in, the whole thing is very much wait and see. So I'm a bit like you in a way, wondering what the hell is coming next. Binge read Anotherlea? Oof, was there ever a more beautiful sentence? Thank you!

NotMrsRachel: Superdupe, lovely one, I look forward to it! I thought the same about the pinning thing, I was all, hang on, didn't he just say, all poetic-like, that Anne was unpindownable. Luckily Gilbert never gives up :o)

J: Hang on, I never knew you liked Gilbert with his clothes _on_ ;oP I loved what you said, you know I did, but it really touched me that you mentioned Rowena. It brings me no end of joy that people love her when I made her all up. Yes, Davy from the Navy is being a very cheeky boy, and I shall relish the writing of him. My goal: to make you go blushy over him, too.

...

Right so, the first bit is almost done, time to get to the meat of the story and get Anne to Charlottetown...


	6. Women's business

_**5**_

Joy does not come in the morning, but Mrs Blythe does in her painted sleigh, a battered green trunk in the back. She heads straight for the back door which nettles Mrs Barry no end. She is churning butter in the middle of the kitchen and spatters of cream collect on her skin like little white grubs. There's barely time to untie her apron and rebutton her cuffs before Rowena appears at the door.

'Morning Ebba, don't mind me, this is not a social call, I'm looking for Anne.'

Of course, she is. Curious woman, you would think Anne was her daughter sometimes. The way she allowed the girl to remain under her roof while her son was there bordered on indecent. They weren't engaged yet, nor were they likely to be going by the sobs she heard from the spare room last night. The intrigues young folk indulged in these days. What happened to a young man going to a girl's father to beg permission to court? Not that such manners would have helped Fred Wright any, her George would have shown him the door. The young upstart; expanding Green Gables like it was his own, using all those newfangled methods and fussing over animals. He got much better prices than George last harvest. A poor way to show respect to a man he hoped would be his father in law. Some hope! Ha!

The butter churn is given such a stab Rowena flinches. 'Shall I come another time?'

'No- no- you sit yourself down-' Ebba utters, in her _I have to do everything_ voice. She steps out of the kitchen then returns in brisk fashion, wiping her hands as if to imply the job was done. 'She's still poorly, I'm afraid... women's business _._ '

Rowena Blythe is hardly going to be put off by that. She rises from her chair and hands Ebba her hat. 'She'll need her trunk.'

'But Ro! George isn't here, how will you get it out of the sleigh?'

Rowena turns in the doorway and gives Ebba Barry a Gilbertine grin. 'How do you think I got it in there in the first place?'

She lugs it all the way down the hall to the front end of the house. The Barry's spare room is a fabled apartment filled with finery not often seen on this part of the Island. Rowena doesn't think much of it, though. It looks _very_ spare to her, almost empty. Even Anne barely makes a hill under the comforters and quilts. Rowena is careful to make a lot of noise -dumping the trunk, dragging a button back chair along the floor to the bedside- so that Anne can't pretend to be asleep.

'Oh dear, did I disturb you?'

'What do you want?' is the muffled demand.

Rowena can't tell if it's the coverings or Anne's state causing her choked up voice. As soon as she lifts the blankets it's clear. Anne looks as though she has been punched or stung her eyelids are that thick. Her entire face has a puffy, slightly green quality, that reminds Rowena of the herb filled muslin bags she plucks out of her tub after a soak. Anne certainly needs one. Her hair is oily and tangled and the room carries the faint odour of iron. Rowena bends down and retrieves a chamber pot from under Anne's bed; the urine in it red with her blood.

'A fine way to comport yourself when you're a guest.'

'Leave that alone, you're not my mother-'

'So you expected Marilla to clean up after you, did you?'

Anne grabs the pot from her and jams it back under the bed. 'I don't expect anything from anyone! I take care of myself!'

'You'll be needing your things then,' says Rowena, unperturbed. 'Your cologne... your little red ring?'

'Don't... don't you... oh please go away...'

Anne buries herself in her bedclothes once more and does something she scarcely believed possible, makes even more tears. Her body convulses with raw sounding sobs. It hurts, everything hurts and being observed only made it worse. Diana peeks her head round the door, brows and eyes like inky question marks. Rowena sends her away.

'Why should I leave you?' she murmurs, smoothing matted tendrils away from Anne's face.

She is hoping her touch might break through Anne's armour, but Anne is tougher than she looks. She bats her away and pulls herself up -slowly though, as if her joints had all rusted.

'I don't know why you want to make me feel better-'

'I'm not looking to make you feel better, what I want is some sense out of you.'

Anne wishes she had stayed under her bedclothes. Marilla would have left her to stew; Mrs Blythe's not going anywhere. 'You spoke to- your son I take it?'

The look on Rowena's face answers that. 'Did I need to? Two people left for the stream yesterday looking like cats that got into Fred Wright's dairy, and neither one of them returned. Oh, I had a fine time last night-'

'But I sent word I would be staying with Ruby-'

'You also left your belongings behind and went straight on to the Barrys. I thought we were going to light the bonfire at the strike of midnight?'

'I'm sorry,' Anne pleads, her chin pressed to her chest. 'I felt- after what happened- it would be wrong of me to intrude.'

'I'm sure you're right,' says Rowena, causing Anne to look up sharply. 'Well aren't you? Clearly you've done something despicable.'

'Not despicable, I hope -not that-' Anne says, all the while berating herself for not looking Mrs Blythe in the eye. 'I'm sure you know, but if you must hear me say it... I- I refused your son.'

Rowena is relieved Anne is staring at her hands because she knows she has gone quite white. For all her warnings, her suspicions, even Gilbert's curt replies, Anne's words strike at her heart. All she can see is Gilbert's dear face. There had been a time when she thought it might work, when Anne's dreams were small and so were his. But she had flowered into something that could not be contained; wanting a girl like that was like wanting Summer to stay.

There was no use his mother telling him, however, there was only waiting till he learned it himself. Rowena takes out her handkerchief and furtively wipes a tear. She needn't have worried. Anne is staring at her hands, like that woman in the Scottish play. It's a good while before Rowena trusts herself to speak. They are not quite the words she wants to say, but still, they must be said.

'You are perfectly within your rights to do so.'

Anne almost sneers when she hears this and eyes Mrs Blythe suspiciously. 'If you think _that_ then why are you here?'

'I told you, to bring you your things.'

Rowena leaves the bed, goes to the trunk and unlatches the lid. On top there is a package the size of a small cabbage wrapped in newsprint. She brings it to Anne and lays it in her hands.

'You weren't going to leave this behind, were you?'

Anne only has to feel the shape beneath her fingers to know what it is. Still, she can't help unwrap it, it's such a touchable thing. A Wedgwood mortar and pestle made of a bisquey bone-coloured earthenware. Rowena had given it to Anne for Christmas. Gilbert had given her a silver chain strung with a heart -then told her she had broken his.

This time Anne can no longer fight it and falls on Rowena's shoulder. She smells of myrtle, dried roses, sage and all the spicy delicious smells that remind Anne of Gilbert's home. It would never be her home now, not ever, and she holds onto Rowena as though she might never see her again.

The feelings in Rowena's heart are very much the opposite. She shifts mid-hug onto the bed and smooths out her corderoy skirts. She's wearing her rust red waistcoat today, the one that makes her look like a robin.

'Now I'm certain I have your ear, there's something I want to ask you.'

But of course she did, Mrs Blythe was never going to make it that easy. All sorts of questions dart about Anne's head like birds shut up in a room.

'Anne, I want you to come with me.'

'I don't understand-'

'I've been cramped up in that cottage for far too long, I'd like to spread my wings while I still have the chance. Seeing Marilla set sail for Sweden kindled a wanderlust in me, and now John is gone it's time to face facts. I'm wasting my skills here- there are more than enough doctors to serve our little village. I'm sure most folks come to me because they think I might turn them into a toad if they don't-'

'That's not true-'

'True enough. Oh Anne, when I think of all you've done in your short life. I'm sorry you're not the marrying kind, but I can't say I'm surprised. The spirit in you is a restless one and I don't think it can be tamed. The world needs more moonstruck pioneers and you're never going to be that in Avonlea. I thought if you came with me, to Batoche, there is so much we can do to help...' She clasps Anne's hand and squeezes it tight. 'Come now, dear, I know very well you're thinking of Gilbert but it's a little late in the day for that. If you want to know his opinion, he said it was up to you.'

It's too much for Anne to take in; the body she looks down at no longer feels like her own, and her voice sounds very far away.

'I'm not a healer, Mrs Blythe...'

Rowena bends forward, about to cup Anne's face in her hands. She finds she can't -not yet- and pinches her nose instead.

'You're a healer alright, right down to your last freckle. The people you've helped since you came here, well it makes my heart swell with pride. I'll never forget the first time we made up our brews together-'

'Belladonna.'

'You remember,' says Rowena, almost in danger of smiling. 'You so impressed me with your skill I thought to myself, now there is a girl with the magic touch.'

'What about Dora? Wasn't she your apprentice? I thought that didn't work out so well.'

'Ah, but you see, Dora _is_ the marrying kind.'

Anne's eyes flash. 'And I'm not?'

'Well that's surprising, suddenly you don't sound so sure.'

Anne thinks of the man she rejected yesterday. Surely no one would make a better husband. He would cherish her like a hand round a flame; make her laugh, make her fight, make her fall to her knees with want for him. But she can't say any of this to his mother, she can barely understand it herself. She knows she has done the right thing, it just doesn't feel like the right thing yet. The whole thing is too new, too fresh to absorb. Her brain is still in pieces, but at least one thing is clear.

'I can't go with you.'

'I'm aware of the plans you made with Diana, but you're never going to be happy teaching, and as Miss Fontaine is laying low-'

Anne bristles when she hears this. As willing as she is to let go of Claire, she suspects Claire is not so willing to let go of her. 'It isn't that, Mrs Blythe. I don't want to go back.'

'But you speak of the prairies with such passion-'

'To stand upon the plains is to stand upon God's shoulders -for the first time I understood forever. But there are memories in that place I'm not looking to revisit. It's all very well reading about it in the papers but to see a battle up close- see people suffer and be helpless to do anything but write about it-'

'But you did help people- and you could again-'

'There is no use trying to convince me. I knew the day I walked out of Riel's cell I would never go back.'

It's not Riel she is thinking of, Anne just says this because it's the easiest way to explain. There's only one person who makes her afraid; the one who comes to her in her dreams. And that's Joe.

'We'll have some tea and little bite to eat,' says Rowena, realising it's time to change the subject.

She retrieves the mortar and pestle from its burrow in the quilt and lays it back in the trunk. As she does this she sees the letters that came for Anne the day before. One from Gilbert, another from the Echo, and a thick white envelope bordered in black. Rowena would keep all three from the girl if she could, just for an hour or two. But it's not up to her. Like Anne said, she is not her mother. She throws Anne a handkerchief and tucks back a white wisp of hair.

'By the way, you've got more mail. I'll leave you to read them in peace.'

There is no peace to be found in those letters. Mr Oliver's goes unread. Gilbert's gets as far as unsticking the envelope before her fingers refuse to work. The black bordered one is a mystery, it's addressed to Miss Mavourneen. Mr Keats used to call her that, but he never put that on the envelope before -who can it be that died?

She plucks out plain white paper, the kind middling businessmen use. At the top are the names Sherwood and Smythe, solicitors from Charlottetown.

 _Dear Miss-_

 _It is my duty to inform you that Mr John Moses Keats met with an accident, survived for a day and is currently deceased-_

Currently? What on earth? Anne shakes her head and gets on her knees, as if that would help it make sense.

 _Upon his deathbed he spoke of a mavourneen which I am led to believe is yourself. His nurse could get no sense from him, excepting "your hair is as red as the roads of Avonlea" and that you lived at a place called Green Gables. If such description fits your person I recommend you come to the office of Sherwood and Smythe at your earliest convenience, that being one o'clock January 5th, concerning the reading of Mr Keats's will._

 _I remain your obedient servant, Crispin U. Smythe_

Anne leaps from the bed and darts to the door. Diana is standing outside.

'Di, please, read this quick, and tell me what you think?'

'Is this from Mrs Blythe?'

Diana knows better than to ask if it's from Gilbert, though her heart sinks a little when she sees that it's not. Her eyes read over the contents thoroughly. Anne grows impatient, she could have read it ten times by now.

'Poor Mr Keats!' Diana utters, 'and poor you, what a time to find this out. But you're standing in the hall in your nightgown, Anne, let's go to my room.'

Diana dashes back and forth fetching kimono, slippers, then a tray piled up with welsh rarebit that is more mustard than cheese.

'He never seemed the sort who had anything to leave behind, I thought he lived at that Old Sailor's Home? Perhaps he wanted to return all the things you've given him over the years, he was a sentimental fellow.'

'Not at first,' says Anne, remembering. 'The first time we spoke he thought Davy Rossi had got me in trouble-'

'No! Anne! Goodness! Though I wouldn't put it past the boy. For all his daring deeds he always struck me as a rascal-'

'With a mistress in every port, no doubt.'

'No doubt,' Diana grins, but it doesn't stay on her face for long. She leaves the last bit of toast for Anne and sighs. 'Poor Ruby-'

'We mustn't judge Davy too hastily, there are plenty of reasons why he had to miss Ruby's party.'

Diana sniffs and crosses her arms. Anne had changed her tune, she was usually the first to point out what a cad he is, though in much more sensational terms. What does she call him? A libertine, a scoundrel, a Romeo, a rake...

'But she gave it in his honour! The Gillis' -no _everyone-_ was expecting them to announce their engagement... Oh!' Diana's hands fly up to her face, then to Anne's, then back again till they comprehensively cover her mouth. 'I'm sorry, I didn't mean-'

Anne peels her hands away and tenderly kisses each one.

'The only engagement I wish we were talking of is yours.'

'And so we shall,' says Diana, suddenly, and leaps up to close the door. 'I mean Mamma will sulk either way-'

'Diana Suzannah Barry, you are _positively wild._ '

'It must be the Worcestershire sauce,' says Diana, and snatches the last bit of toast.

...

 _* opening line from that eternal favourite, 'weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning' from Psalms_

 _* just in case you're wondering Anne always gets her period at the end of the month/ beginning of the month. (Go on, check!)_

 _* 'moonstruck pioneers' is a tip o the hat to Gilbert's line in Anne of the Island_

 _* I got the idea of Mrs Blythe going out west to help the communities out there when I was reading about Mother Hannah Grier Coome. She lost her only child and her husband within a year. Later she became a nun, founded the Sisterhood of St John the Divine, and received a medal for her work at the North West Rebellion._

 _* Mr Keats first features in Anotherlea._

 _* Mavourneen is an Irish term for my darling_

 _* welsh rarebit is like cheese on toast, except the cheese is mixed with mustard, ale and worcestershire sauce. (Mrs Barry probably skipped the ale)_

 _..._

wishwars: yes she is a very different Anne in some ways, and going off to have adventures has its costs. I think if Gilbert hadn't felt so embarrassed he might have hung around to work things out. Don't worry, they'll spend the rest of the story doing just that :o)

Lizzy: the story I was thinking of was The Courage to Try Again. That story shredded me. As for this one, while I am taking inspo from Far from the Madding Crowd I have to reference Anne of the Island too, because otherwise it's not Anne. A car crash proposal was always on the cards but don't worry there is way more to come. So glad to have you along!

julie: I'm not surprised the fine line showed because I worked really hard on that scene. It was important to show this as a collision of needs and bodies rather than a meeting of hearts and minds. Thank you so much for such beautiful comments, I think you know what they mean to me. You shall find out more about Mr Blythe very soon, unlike Anotherlea he is very much at the heart of this story.

Catie: I don't think this chapter requires ice cream, but what the hell, have another bowl if you like :o) I'm so proud you liked it because you know what I realised? That's the first time I have written an AU proposal scene. I KNOW! It's practically Anne Fanfic 101, how did I miss this? Remember Jenn with a Penn, when Gilbert went in for that kiss in the rain? An Anne and Gilbert classic, Cate, just like yours. Feels good to be in such fine company.

Guest: Are you my mum? ;oP

stillpink: hello, nice to meet you. I'm unsure what you mean by Team Gilbert, does that mean you're not Team Anne, or you won't be Team Davy or Team Will? I'm glad Gilbert's character resonated with you. Sometimes I picture that boy with the mayflowers in AotI and I think, How did he get from there to here? It's great to have you along :o)

MrsRachel: If I had another prize to give you I would, because I was thinking of that scene too. Thank you so much for mentioning it!

Regina: I've lived in Germany and the Netherlands so I understand cold, though I would love to know the opinion of a Canadian if there's one lurking. I've written so much about their history and it matters that I get it right. My third highest readership is from Canada which has never happened before. Thank you for your PM, I love thinking of you in the wee smas reading this story. I promise all your questions will be answered :o)

J: when I hit on the breathing metaphor I knew I had it right, so I'm glad you liked that too. I laughed when you said only I would think of a proposal like this, it felt natural at the time (like breathing) then after I pressed POST I started to wonder. But someone once told me that that's where the good stuff is, in the places we are afraid to go (I think that someone was you :o)

eliza: that's the thing with writing stories, we send them out to the world and have no say in how they are interpreted; they take on lives of their own. Thank you for such a detailed and insightful review, as I said before I don't know where you find the time.

Pelirroja: yeah all roads lead to the stream! You know I don't know what I like better, them all wet and hot, or them all shivery and holding each other. They had sex now because sex is not the goal here. Poor Gilbert though, no happy ending for him in that chapter ;oP

Hazel Auburn: you're hilarious!

oz diva: I was very tempted to have Rowena 'silly girl' Anne in this chapter, but I thought Rowena might not survive the saying of it ;oP Fred and Di are pretty great, though. Honestly, one of the greatest pleasures of these stories is giving them a rolicking romance. By the way, I read your M, more on that later, you sauce pot!

...

Sorry I didn't quite get Anne to Charlottetown, but in chapter six I will. Thank you for reading and reviewing, faving and following. I will always write my best for you.

Later, k


	7. The wind bloweth where it listeth

**_6_**

She's dressed in black. He stands in such a rigid, upright fashion he might be a post. The train is taking on more coal, and a sharp wind spiked with sleet funnels between the engine and the buildings that make up Bright River station. Everyone else who wants to board is sheltering in the waiting room, but for reasons best known to themselves the two figures on the platform choose to stand in the snow. Not till the final whistle sounds do they realise the train is leaving, and they dart to the nearest carriage and reach for the door.

'After you,' he says, stepping away.

Anne thinks he intends to try his luck in another carriage, perhaps he had been, but as the train starts to move he leaps inside and ruffles the lapels of his coat. The gentleman seated opposite Anne gives him a pointed harumph. Gilbert can't decide where to sit. In the end he takes a seat near Anne, at least then he can avoid her eyes.

'My condolences,' he says next, and tips his hat. 'I didn't know you were bereaved.'

'Thank you,' Anne replies. 'I don't believe you met him.'

The man opposite would struggle to believe these two young people were anything more than nodding acquaintances. Their stiff, mannered air impresses him however, particularly the girl in black. She's an arresting creature with stark green eyes and cheeks like russet apples. He'd like to gaze at that himself, but he has that smuggler story to catch up on, and opens his paper with an enthusiastic crack.

The other two begin reading the front page, until Anne realises they are craning to make out the same article. After that she peers out the window, watching sleet collect on the glass then scatter with the wind. It doesn't absorb her the way it usually does, but what did she expect? Those feelings aren't about to fade just because he... She closes her eyes against the thought, but she can still see his face; the vivid expression of bliss he felt as his body moved against hers.

She senses him shifting uncomfortably as though he is reading her mind. He sits forward in his seat, legs wide, arms dangling between, leather gloved fingers threaded together. She notices his shoes. They're not the boots he usually wears, these are narrow toed and shining, the laces tied in even bows. His trousers are a fine wool in a becoming charcoal colour, his coat is old but it has definitely been brushed and hugs his broad shoulders just so. The crisp collar of his shirt cuts into his neck as though he knotted his tie too tight. Anne can't make that out but she can see his throat and a bobbing Adam's apple. The skin there has been carefully shaved, as has his jaw and his upper lip. She can't help it now and glances at the rest of his face. Light bounces off his brows and lashes they are both so thick and dark. His hair is too, almost black with hair oil and not one strand out of place. Only the merest bits can be seen beneath his hat. She's never seen it before, then she remembers it used to be his father's. John Blythe had never once dressed this carefully. Gilbert looks pristine, untouchable. Whatever has happened between them Anne is determined he stay that way.

She feels shabby and dull in her old blacks; alarmed that something she wore so long ago still fits. Her throat is choked by all the things she wants to say; if the man with the paper doesn't leave soon she this close to pushing him out. He finally departs at Rustico and offers his paper to Gilbert. He barely has time to unfold it before Anne plucks it out of his hand.

'Were you going to leave without saying goodbye?'

'I thought my letter said that,' says Gilbert briskly. As an afterthought he adds, 'I'm not due back at school till the 8th. There's a course text I need before I go back. I'm stopping at Charlottetown.'

Anne nods, eagerly, the wax berries on her hat nodding with her.

'So am I. It was Mr Keats- Mr Keats who died. His lawyer summoned me to his office on Yarmouth Street. I'm not sure what to expect, I imagine there are some books Mr Keats wanted me to have.'

'Books?' says Gilbert, 'I thought he was blind?' then silently curses himself. As sorry as he is for her loss, he doesn't want her thinking he knows every particular of her life. His question embarrasses him, but it touches Anne and she squeezes Gilbert's fingers briefly. If he is grateful for anything at that moment, it's that he's wearing gloves.

'I used to read to him,' she says. 'Though he liked books for themselves as much as for the words they contained. He knew all about them; paper grades, ink types, kettle stitch, butterfly... recto, verso, belly, flap-'

'Sorry?'

Anne cheeks go from russet to crimson. 'I- I don't know where that came from. I was remembering him. Forgive me.'

'There's nothing to forgive, Anne. I said that in my letter, too.'

The train enters Darlington Station and they both wait to see if the other will excuse themselves and seek out another carriage. If someone else enters, if he has time, Gilbert is resolved to leave. But no one comes and there are no more stops until Charlottetown. He turns the tiniest fraction toward her. He can just make out her jaw, and the muscles tight beneath it. Her hands are in her lap and though they're still buttoned she keeps pulling at the fingertips of her gloves. He pictures the ring she might have been wearing; what they could be doing alone on a train. And it hits him gut deep, the chance he took; another might have been he can't stop thinking about.

The train hisses as it departs. They pass Miltonvale and Brackley before either can bear to speak. Anne begins first, her voice so low he can scarcely make it out above the pounding engine.

'I didn't like that letter much.'

'I didn't like writing it much, but as I behaved so appallingly-'

'So did I.'

'Yes, you did,' he says simply. 'We both did, but there's no need to punish my mother into the bargain.'

Anne turns to him, she can't help it -not if she had been bound to the spot. She pulls off her gloves and flings them onto the opposite seat.

'Are you referring to Batoche? Your mother is perfectly capable of taking care of herself-'

'My mother has lived in Avonlea all her life. She has no idea what it means to be among strangers- to have no one to call on if something goes wrong.'

Anne had in fact given Mrs Blythe the names and addresses of many who would be happy to assist her; not least Mother Hannah, who would welcome such a woman into the fold. There is no way Gilbert could be ignorant of this and she tells him so.

'That's all well and good, Anne, the thing is she asked you.'

He trusts himself to look at her now. Her eyes are still downcast, her brows tilted in another frown.

'I never told her to go, nor encouraged, nor hinted. I was as surprised as you were when she told me of her plans-'

'Then _go-'_ Gilbert urges.

Anne begins to see why. He wants her gone, but it won't square with his principles so he appeals to her sense of honour instead. She sits a little taller, despite herself, her slender neck rising from the collar of her cloak.

'I can't.'

'Why not? I don't understand you-'

'Yes you do!' Anne fires back. 'You know exactly who I am -only _now_ you don't like it.'

Gilbert leaps up and flings himself onto the other seat. Anne has lowered her head so that all her can see is the crown of her hat. The berries she had trimmed it with were so blue they almost look black. He thinks of the day he fed one to her and daubed red juice on her finger. In his heart he had promised himself to her that day. The night they made their blood oath he had marked her as his own.

Anne shoots a look at him suddenly, as if she can hear his thoughts. The eyes that peek out below her black brim are serious and grave. There's a queenishness in her demeanor that reminds him of the girl who always held herself apart. He used to admire that about her; the way she refused to change herself in order to fit in. Her iron will, her independence, her fierce need to explore. But he knew where she was going then, because he was going that way too.

The train pulls into Central Station. Gilbert plucks Anne's gloves from the bench seat and lays them in her lap. As she grabs them he crouches down on one knee, his hazel eyes unyielding.

'Just tell me one thing. Does this have anything to do with the Convocation dinner last year?'

'The wha- ? Gilbert, no-'

'Those people at our table -Dr Evans and his colleague- what they said about Claire Fontaine was vicious and crude-'

'Gil, I know. I excused myself for your sake not for mine.'

Anne thinks of Fred and Mrs Lynde -and now his mother. She has only been home a month and is already causing trouble. It seems to follow her everywhere and probably always will. While she might be used to it, Gilbert never would.

'My sake, huh? So if I had to quit school for some reason you wouldn't change your mind?'

'You better not,' she says, appalled, 'I'll hunt you down if you do.'

He bends his head to swallow the rocks in his throat, his hand brushing over the skirts on his feet. She wore black for a whole year when Matthew died and no one could talk her out of it. Anne never did a thing she didn't mean. She always knew who she was.

'You know, you told me you don't want to be a doctor's wife but maybe you don't want to be anyone's wife.'

Anne smiles faintly. 'You sound like your mother.'

'Do I? I guess we're more alike than I want to admit.'

'Gilbert, believe me, I would give you both what you want if I could-'

Gilbert stands abruptly and brushes down his trousers. 'I have to go, my Aunt will be waiting. I'd introduce you, but I'm sure you'd had your fill of Blythes.' He tips his hat at her once more. 'I wish you well, Anne Shirley.'

Gilbert leaves the door wide open and strides along the platform as if expecting the crowds to part. Anne leans against the window in order to watch him go. His tall upright figure crumples unexpectedly as he bends down to greet a small boy. The next moment he has swung the lad onto his shoulders, and twirls him round about. Anne watches them jog to the east exit and disappear down the stairs. The whistle shocks her out a memory and she hastens out of the carriage.

'That was lucky!' says a porter, clutching the filthy brim of his hat. 'You nearly ended up in Frenchfort. Got a connection? Best hurry, young Miss-'

The young Miss smiles briefly, not at him, for the wind that threatens to take the porter's pillbox and her berry trim with it. Locals call it The Cat for the way it claws and thieves anything that is not tied down. It also carries tales of this town; secrets and stories that remain hidden to the eye. Anne could close hers and know by smell and sound alone exactly where she was.

Seagulls shriek and fight each other, as do children, red nosed and barefoot, picking their way through blackened slush. Bells chime out from St Marks and St, Pauls, the Catholic Basilica, the Lutheran church. The paperboys bawl, the nutsellers chirp, shore leave sailors belt out bawdy verse. Tittering ladies highstep it in pairs, hanging off men with wives at home. Another woman all in white preaches hellfire from her barrel with a bible in her hand. It was coming, she could smell it, in the sulphur of coal smoke, the stacks at the hospital throwing up ash. The resinous scent of newly made crates, timber, sawdust, pine sap, straw. In hot oily chestnuts, baked potatoes, pickled whelks, salt water taffy, and two penny broth. The flower sellers posies, carnations and pinks, petals trod into manure and muck. In the stench of the gutters writhing with rats, the scraps that even the poor wouldn't touch. The warm yeast of bakehouse, the hot tang of the noodle house, the odour of liniment, leather and horse. The smoulder of smoked fish, the reek of the canneries, the spice of the Gypsy boys selling fortunes and curses. In the blood, grease and sweat of the mighty harbour, all of it seasoned with the salt of the sea...

Anne takes a deep breath and welcomes it in.

'No,' she says, lifting her head. 'I'm for Charlottetown.'

...

 _* chapter title from John 3:8 KJV (listeth in this sense means 'wherever it wants to go') If you're wondering why I always reference KJV it's because it's likely to be the bible that Anne knew  
_

 _* recto, belly, verso, flap are bookbinding terms_

 _* 'the girl who held herself apart' is a reference to the line 'Anne held herself apart (from pettiness) not consciously or of design, but simply because anything of the sort was utterly foreign to her transparent and impulsive nature' Ch 19 Anne of Avonlea_

 _* berry scene and blood oath in Anotherlea, the 27th chapter and the 34th chapter respectively  
_

 _* 'The Cat' wind first mentioned in Anotherlea, the 21st chapter_

 _..._

cate: I've been thinking about that too, what it means to be true to your heart. I think by today's standards of marriage Anne would grab onto Gilbert in a second, but being a wife back then was a totally different deal. People get disappointed when they see Anne as the 'little housewife' in AHoD and AoI etc, but that was the reality, women had to change themselves a lot and if you weren't ready to do that, then well, misery. Add children (huge numbers) and the strong possibility of widowhood and you can see why parental permission, courtship, saving, striving and staying chaste was such a big deal. It really makes me think, I mean you really make me think. Ta, love!

stillpink: that's a really good point! Maybe Anne felt she didn't need him which tends to make people careless. She knew what it meant to lose Diana, and worked hard to win the Cuthbert's love because she had lost her own parents. Phil was probably the first person who was as smart as she was and as difficult to love. I think she needed a friendship like that in order to appreciate what she had with Gilbert. It makes sense that it was Phil not Diana who was instrumental in bringing them together.

NotMrsRachel: I've always seen Anne as a catalyst character, she sets things off in other people for better or for worse, and I love that about her. She's never passive, she feels what she feels, be that sadness, anger, whimsy or desire. I realise the Anne of the later books isn't much like that which is why I wrote Anotherlea, to see what would happen if her passion was not so tempered. By the way your suggestions for Will Baron's manor are so good I'm going to use both of them, one for the manor and one for later on. Thank you!

Guest: Well I had to get that in there somehow. Some things are sacred :o)

J: Ta very much. Yes I thought I better get her off to Charlottetown since that's the name of the flaming story. I like writing Rowena too, I initially had her take Anne's pot because menstrual blood is super powerful, but I thought that might be a step too far. (You think?) Ebba has also been interesting, I suppose she's a study in what happens when you won't let a hurt go. Right now I have no idea if she will be redeemed or not, but you know, I just pants it and it usually works out ;oP

Regina: We get Story Stats which breaks down where readers come from. The biggest chunk always comes from USA, then (in declining order) it's usually Australia, a European country, then Canada and so on. Writing about a Canadian book/ characters/ history, I always hoped to appeal to Canadian readers -it just really matters to me- that's why I'm so happy about them being my 3rd highest readership for Charlottetown. The highest ranking European country for Charlottetown is Germany. In Anotherlea it was Finland. I'm sorry I made your heart hurt, but I'm ok with you not liking Anne sometimes, that just makes her more real :o)

eliza: did you mean you wanted Anne and Rowena to pair off in a romantic sense? I've done my share of same sex romance and I've never shied away from it, but this time I wanted to tackle something new. The 'mysterious benefactor' shouldn't have been too surprising, it's mentioned in the summary. Joe is referred to in the prologue and in chapters 3 and 6.

...

Thank you for reading. I have managed to get seven chapters done in one month which I'm stupidly happy about. I have some other pressing work that needs me now, so I won't be posting till mid March at least.

Love always, kwak.


	8. Great Expectations

**_I tried to stay away from this story but I couldn't. It might be possible that I can get out a chapter once a week if I manage my time very carefully. Anyway, here's one that came out in the spaces where nothing else needed me. I hope you enjoy it. Love kwak.  
_**

 ** _..._**

 ** _7_**

Crispin U. Smythe is a short, plump man with a perfectly parted waxed moustache and a velvet flocked cravat. Anne sizes him up immediately as someone who wishes to impress his importance, when in fact he had little to none. He is at the typewriter when she enters his office; a small, crowded room up three flights of stairs. There's no secretary to ask her to wait, no room to wait in, just this funny little fellow who looks slightly alarmed to be caught doing the paperwork.

'Are you Sherwood or Smythe?' Anne asks him. She is fairly sure there is no Sherwood. The man probably didn't have a middle name either, let alone one that began with a U.

Smythe wipes his hands on a dainty handkerchief, before bolting toward her with an eager handshake. 'Sherwood is- out- for the moment… Business at Fanningbank-' he adds suggestively, and taps his strawberry nose.

Anne's green eyes sparkle with mischief. 'The Premier's residence? Well I won't inquire any further, sir.'

'I could tell you nothing if you _did_ ,' Smythe assures her.

As a sign of his favour he lifts a pile of papers off the grandfather chair squashed into the corner, and offers it to the mysterious lady in widow's weeds. Instead she takes the stool opposite a desk buckling under files and books, and smiles at him, politely. Coffee is offered, cocoa, tea, a tour of the office, an opinion on the weather. Anne soon realises Mr Smythe has no idea why she is here, or even who she is.

'I'm not late, am I? The appointment regarding Mr Keats' will was at one pm today?'

'Keats- Keats-' drum drum go the fingers... 'Ah, yes, Mr Keats! Well you certainly _look_ like the girl described.'

Anne's not sure if that's a compliment or not, and gives him a tactful smile. 'I'm afraid Mr Keats' description could only be what I told him myself. We became friends many years after he lost his sight. He told me he'd visited Avonlea before, but that was over twenty years ago. I first met him at a Sailors Home, the one near Arrow Point.'

'That a fact- that a fact-' says Smythe, with interest. He takes out a piece of paper and starts jotting down some notes. 'Then you won't know of your rather sizable inheritance, I take it?'

'My _what?_ ' Anne starts, the smile fleeing from her face.

Smythe clears his throat emphatically, then sits back in his chair and pats the wooden arm rests; how he relished being the bearer of unexpected news. 'I can tell you no more, my dear, unless I have some proof of your identity.'

Anne had expected this, and retrieves some letters John Keats had sent to her. 'Mavourneen was one of his pet names- but Mr Smythe, there must be some mistake. Mr Keats lived very simply, he was also blessed with the gift of the gab. I'm sure he would have told me if there had been some secret treasure lurking in his past.'

'Well I hope you're not expecting a pot of gold!' Smythe grumbles. He had hoped the girl would weep pretty tears when she heard his surprising announcement. A modest business in the Harbour district might not seem much to the more refined lady, but going by her oldfangled garb this girl was clearly of reduced means. It was nothing but greediness hoping for more -but wasn't it always the way? People came into his office with nothing, only to declare that the something they were to expect was nowhere near enough!

'Believe me,' Anne says, still reeling with the news, 'I came here with no expectations. I assumed Mr Keats had left me some books-'

Smythe does a great deal of snorting at this, and bursts into phlegm strung laughter. 'Books!' he chortles. 'Oh, he left you some books, alright!' He totters over to the hatstand and removes a brightly checked coat. 'Come, Miss ah- Shirley, is it? Allow me to show you _exactly_ how many books the man left to you.'

For such an energetic man Crispin U. Smythe walks very gingerly. The streets in this area are pitted with potholes, mud stained slush and piles of manure; one poor fellow with ragged trousers has buried his bare feet in a steaming pile. Smythe looks at him aghast and then down at his own white spatted shoes.

'I do apologise-' he keeps saying, turning his head in Anne's direction.

'Mr Smythe, I suggest you look where you're going, instead of back at me,' Anne says. She tosses the man ankle deep in muck a silver coin from her satchel; to her horror it lands right in it. Thankfully its recipient couldn't care less. He stuffs it under his flatcap and carries on warming his feet.

Yarmouth Street stretches out like a dog's leg down to Fair Way where trams, carts, buggies and wagons weave all over the road. Anne takes her guide's hand and nimbly leads him through the traffic, the stray goat, the hurdy gurdy with a broken wheel, the children bouncing around it, and the gaping hole near the gutter where raw sewerage can be seen flowing brownly to the sea.

Once those obstacles have been tackled Mr Smythe takes the lead again, and points out Derby Street. The books are not there however, nor on Idris Avenue, or the little lane they enter next, where a girl with a shorn head sits in a doorway cradling a baby -or is it a piglet? Once they emerge from that dripping dark walkway even Anne feels the need to brush down her skirts. The hovels there are slick with slime, and the lane so narrow she is sure her cloak touched either side.

After passing through a second such lane she catches a smell of the sea. By her reckoning she is west of the Harbour, close to Mungo Pier. Anne isn't as familiar with this part of Charlottetown. When she went hunting for Davy all those years ago she kept her search to the places a sailor would go; taverns, hostels, Music Halls and the aptly named Congress Row where women in tilted hats and rouged cheeks advertised their wares. The Pier is where the steam packets docked, and cargo ships from Boston, New York, Halifax and St Johns. There are also rows of warehouses filled with the mainland's manufactured goods; hardware, glassware, steam engines, tobacco, fabric, paper and fancy goods. Here too are the wharf hands and stevedores loading up ships with the Island's best: smoked fish, canned fish, fresh eggs, pickled beets, and endless sacks of potatoes. Mr Barry had taken the girls there once, in order to show them where his prized Early Roses ended up.

'On the tables of Boston's _Brahmin Elite,'_ George Barry said, proudly, and gave his eldest daughter a kiss.

They wouldn't have made it last year, however, most of that harvest got struck with the blight.

Anne secures her hat more firmly, before Smythe leads her onto a wide cobbled street with the delicious sounding name of Challmallivon Road. Had it been in a more stylish part of town it might have been called a Promenade. The shore-side buildings give way to a low stone wall, and beyond that is a sliver of beach. The road is wide and well maintained in order to convey the trades, though only those that have to be venture out this afternoon. The wind is sharp and so bad tempered it doesn't blow the sleet so much as spit it at their faces.

'Nearly there,' Smythe says brightly, tugging his companion's elbow.

Anne bristles when he does this, but it has nothing to do with the weather. She isn't used to being led, and cannot shake the feeling that she knows the way far better than he does. 'Mr Smythe, we're heading _away_ from the warehouses-'

'Warehouses? Pooh! What I have to show you is _far_ better than that!'

They stop at the corner near a huddle of shops, each with a pitched roof so pointed they look like witches hats. First is a tailors, next a shoemakers, and right at the end a dank little bookshop, its stone step so worn it looks like a ladle. A closed sign hangs inside the door -or rather it sticks with grime and dust and has never been turned around. On either side of the door are two tall windows featuring equally dismal displays. One shows last years Christmas cards with evil looking etchings of the Ghost of Christmas Past and a malevolent looking Scrooge. In the other is an enormous tome bound in leather the colour of peasoup, carrying the preposterous price of seventy-five dollars and thirteen cents.

Smythe crosses his arms and looks at Anne, expectantly. Anne's patience is about to run out.

'Forgive me, sir, I don't understand, are Mr Keats' books in there?' she says, pointing at the tumbledown shop.

'Oh, they're in there, alright,' he says emphatically, waving his arms about. 'This entire enterprise- books- building- the people inside it if you like- all of it, all of it, all of it yours! What do you say to _that_ , young lady!'

The young lady has sudden cause to take Smythe's arm in earnest, and he guides her to the low stone wall. The grey sea laps up against it, thick with yellow curds of spume.

'Thought that was ice for a moment,' he says, 'couldn't have that, could we, the harbour freezing up?'

Anne shakes her head but the words won't come, and she stares out at the horizon. It's so different to the prairies, yet somehow the same. The grey of the sea and the grey of the sky made for a different kind of forever.

'What say we get out of this nasty gale?' Smythe suggests.

Anne responds with an encouraging smile. 'No Mr Smythe. If you can bear it, tell me everything you know.'

Mr Smythe cannot bear it, and when he takes her to a tea room near the warehouses Anne can see why. He had jammed his top hat on so tight a deep indentation scored his brow and matched the colour of his nose. He was very forthcoming with information, however. The book shop had been John Keats' father's, but John had shirked his filial duties and ran away to sea. He left the business to his younger brother -and his bond with him in tatters. Samuel Keats did not want to be a bookseller either; he yearned to become a monk.

'He was one of your stricter Catholics -Franciscan I believe-'

'The ones who reject all worldly goods -he wouldn't have made much of a businessman then?'

Crispin U. wriggles uncomfortably and rubs at the mark on his head. 'It's not in the best condition, I grant you-'

Anne laughs. 'From the little I saw it seemed like they were trying to drive business away.' Smythe almost pouts as she says this; for all his airs he saw himself as a sort of fairy godfather, down to the gaudy diamante on his velvet cravat. Anne she can't help it, she likes this curious man, and hides another smile behind a cup of hot chocolate. It's all so strange, so unexpected; her journey here this morning feels very far away. 'Can you tell me what happened to Samuel?' she asks.

'Died on a pilgrimage some time back, childless and wifeless naturally. A Mr Mead has the running of the shop, you shall meet him in due course.'

Mr Mead, Anne thinks. A man with such a name couldn't help but be sweet. Surely he will help her make sense of it all. 'Well then,' she says, rising from the table, 'what say we do that right now?'

To get into the bookshop you need to kick at the doorplate then wedge your shoulder hard against the door. It groans as they enter and squeaks when they close it. A man working at a bench on the left side of the room bellows, 'Kick it!' Another man at a bench on the right shouts, 'Shop!' Neither look up at their visitors, giving Anne the opportunity to have a good look at them. One seems to have the innards of a book strung from some sort of mediaeval torture contraption. He has a stocking cap pulled low on his head, ruddy cheeks and a fabulous aquiline nose. His long fingered hands making minuscule stitches as he stares over brass rimmed spectacles. Opposite him stands the other man, who hunches over a fine steel plate and deftly teases out hair-thin coils with some sort of chisel. His eyes flick up at Anne, briefly, a look a disdain in his deep blue eyes. He wears a hat too, a bowler, and has a lustrous black moustache. His bottom lip glistening like stewed rhubarb as he barks his order again.

' _Shop!_ '

A moth eaten curtain parts swiftly and a tiny woman appears. She has silvery curls peeking out from her cap yet her face is young and lively. Her eyes are blue too, like Jasperware plates, and her mouth emits frantic clucks.

'Keep you hats on, I'm coming, I'm coming...' she fusses, and darts over to Anne and Smythe. 'How do?' she says in a thick Irish brogue, 'what brings you here today?'

Smythe doffs his hat and makes a low bow. 'Mrs Brennan, I've found her,' he says grandly. 'Allow me to introduce Mr Keats' _mavourneen._ '

Before Anne can speak the man torturing the book stabs himself and yells 'Blast!' The other man's chisel clatters to the floor. Neither of them move an inch however, nor look in Anne's direction. Anne is this close to laughing again. She bites her lip and offers her hand to Mrs Brennan.

'Please,' she says, in as even voice as she can manage, 'call me Anne.'

Orla Brennan takes her hand as though she has been handed a sock. 'Tea?' she says at last -well tea fixed everything, didn't it?- and dashes through the curtain on tiptoeing feet.

Anne follows, pausing momentarily as she passes the two men so that they might introduce themselves. They don't. One cleans his chisel with spirits, the other sucks on his thumb. Anne struts by, smartly, and enters the back of the shop. It is a few degrees warmer in here, but not much. A thick shawl has been draped over a threadbare armchair bearing the shape of Orla Brennan. Beside it is some knitting and beside that a pot bellied stove. The kettle on top makes lukewarm cups of tea, which Orla downs in one.

'Don't look to me for anythink, will you? I'm just the Do-it-all. Cleaning, fetching, that sort of thing, know nothing of books and whatnot -oh but you won't get rid of me, will you, Miss Anne? I need all the work I can get. My Jack's got hisself herniated, flat on his back at home. Those sacks they have to load onto the boats- some of them must be two hundred pound.' Orla sneaks a look at the pudgy lawyer as she says this, as if divining his own weight.

Smythe clears his viscous throat. 'Now, now, Mrs Brennan, all in due course. Perhaps you can show Miss Shirley the premises?'

'I'm sure you have enough to do,' Anne says to Orla. 'The men front of shop might be more helpful-'

'Helpful?' Orla Brennan erupts, and slaps her knee. 'They only thing they care for are their shuddersome books. That and their folly. Oh, folly can make them do anythink!'

Anne isn't sure what she means by that, perhaps it is an Irish phrase, and asks after Mr Mead instead.

'Him! Oh, he's well out of it! Cursed us, he did, cursed us one and all-'

' _Mrs Brennan-_ ' Smythe interrupts, nervously, 'do as I say now, there's a good woman, and show the young lady around.'

There isn't much to see as far as Anne can tell. The shop looks to be about twelve feet wide and forty feet long, with two plate glass windows at the front and a rough looking timber wall at the back, covering what should have been the back door. It looks as though it had been put up recently -perhaps the original wall had fallen down? The rest of the building looks close to following. The plaster is all mildew and cracks; chunks the size of wagon wheels fallen away showing rusty red brick beneath. Some shelves had been bolted to them in a haphazard fashion, piled with dusty unwanted books. By the door there is an ornate brass till also covered with dust and the dirt that blew in from the street. It looked like it hadn't been used for months. Not that this was surprising, Anne can't imagine anyone bothering to come in here. There isn't even a light for customers to see by, the men at their benches commandeered all the lamps.

'The big nosed man is Thistlethwaite, the moustachioed one is Pegerim. They haven't spoke for _two whole years_ -'

'But that can't be right,' Anne cuts in, 'I heard them as we entered the shop-'

Mrs Brennan rolls her eyes.

'To each _other_ , I mean. It's all folly's doing. By and bye you'll understand. You'll have to excuse me now, Miss Anne, I got to do the washing up.'

Anne expects to see her gather the chipped tea cups, instead she bustles through the curtain and out into the shop. The next moment the front door groans and Mr Thistlethwaite yells, 'Kick it!' before it squeaks shut again.

'Perhaps you'd like to see upstairs,' Smythe says, offering his arm again.

The stairs are like something you'd see on a ship, narrow and so steep Anne has to bundle her skirts under one arm and cling to the banister in order to climb them. Being the gentleman, Smythe waits for her to ascend completely before joining her on the top floor. He finds the girl with her arms wrapped about her, looking through an enormous arched window to a view of the sea.

'This was Samuel Keats' quarters, I believe,' he says.

'He lived up here?' Anne says, amazed, then looks around her. The thick oak beams, the gothic window; it did look a bit like a church. It was quiet too, far too quiet for a house above a business. It seemed impossible that such a place could afford to employ anyone, let alone make a profit. Anne sits on the thick stone ledge and rubs her hands on her knees. She is sorry to have to sell it. Mr Keats might have done so years ago; that he didn't told Anne how much the place meant to him. She feels badly for Mrs Brennan too, but with no Mr Mead, and the other two taking great pains to ignore her, there is no way for her to make this work. It was a shame really. She would have liked a bolthole in Charlottetown; had missed the place more than she knew. The town has a mixed reputation which Anne can't help but admire. The rest of the Island thought their capital the very last word in style and industry. The rest of the world had other ideas. Charlottetown was founded by misfits, rejects and pirates. A place you ended up in, not a place you wanted to go...

The window pane behind her trembles in its casement as the door below is forced open again. Anne can just make out 'Kick it!' followed by 'Shop!' and finds herself grinning when by rights she should be in tears.

'Must be a customer,' says Smythe encouragingly, and dear man that he is, goes downstairs as if hoping to make the sale himself.

The customer can't have lingered long, for the arched window rattles in the casement again. Anne is about to peer onto the street when a tip tip tap strikes rapidly upon the narrow stairs. Up pops a girl not much older than Anne, a heavy basket laden with books on her arm. Anne's not sure what to ask her first: who she is, or how she managed to get up the stairs with such a load? There's no chance of a word escaping her lips. The girl flings her shawl on the banister and rushes to the window before Anne can move.

'Ooh, there he is, wouldn't I like some of that? Go on, honey, see for yourself-'

Anne isn't inclined to ogle some man in the street and studies the girl curiously. Her buxom figure, tawny complexion and wide set, long lashed eyes remind Anne of her troublesome Jersey cow. Her collarless dress is daringly low and a strange looking silver cross nestles comfortably between her breasts.

'Why you want to look at me when you could be looking at God's gift -I'm not being blasphemous, tell me you don't think Adam himself looked exactly like that?' She dumps the basket of books on the floor and gives her shoulder a rub. 'It's such a relief to meet you, Miss. The Conk and the Mo swore you were nothing but a filthy dream in old man Keats' head!'

'Beg pardon?' Anne splutters.

'Ooh, sorry was that rude. I should have said-' here she crouches over and does a striking impression of the man in the bowler hat- 'Mr Thistlethwaite and Mr Pegerim. They said boo to you yet? No? Not surprised. Don't let them put you off, honey. This little place you've got yourself, why you're sitting on a goldmine!'

At this the girl dips into a worn leather purse that is buckled onto her belt, and pulls out of wad of dirty notes.

'Was a bit slow today but don't you worry, I got nearly thirty orders-'

Anne shakes her head and starts to laugh.

'I don't understand,' she says for what feels like the hundredth time today.

'I'm the book agent, aren't I? You know, the one who keeps this place going? Stick with me, Miss,' she says, nudging Anne with her elbow. 'Now that _Reedy Meady's_ gone, we can get this place running just how we like it.'

'We?' Anne says, 'but who _are_ you exactly?'

'Miss Filomena Iskander,' she says, giving Anne a mock salute. 'But everyone calls me Folly- ooh, he's going- quick now, get yourself a good look!'

Anne can't help herself and peers down at the sleet spattered street. At first all she sees are women, two of them, one in the ugliest hat Anne has ever seen, one shivering with cold. Behind her is a small boy who looks strangely familiar, and a man bent over to open an umbrella. He offers it to the young woman rubbing the sleeves of her coat, and she gives him a shy little smile.

'Gilbert,' Anne utters, her hands on the glass.

'You _know_ him?' Folly squeals. 'Well get down there and get him back! He said he was after some Latin book-'

'I'm sure he'll find everything he needs,' Anne murmurs, watching them go.

The boy he's holding hands with, he must be the one from the station. The older woman must be his aunt, the other girl a cousin -though she doesn't remember him mentioning one. Anne is glad she still has her hat on, Gilbert always said the least red thing always caught his eye. She thinks of the almandine ring he tried to give her -she had left it in the snow...

Anne swallows down a sharp edged cry and turns away from the window. She can do this, she can -what did Marilla always say? Just plant one foot in front of the other, my girl. All the same it wouldn't hurt to sit for a moment, and she leans against the window surround and pulls her knees to her chest.

'There's one name I still don't know,' she says, softly, her eyes drawn back to the view. 'What do I call this odd little shop?'

Folly kicks off her boots with a thump and tucks her toes next to Anne's.

'Well it's The Red Oak, isn't it,' she says, beaming. 'But _you,_ lucky duck, you get to call it whatever you like. This is your home now.'

 **...**

 _* widow's weeds are mourning clothes._

 _* Arrow Point and Mungo Pier first mentioned in Anotherlea. Just so you know, I have never tried to write of Charlottetown as it actually is, I'm just using it for inspiration the same way Maud used Cavendish as inspiration for Avonlea, and Halifax for Kingsport. The line about Charlottetown having an iffy reputation came from research. Here's a quote:  
_

 _'It had a reputation of being a town of drunkards and criminals. A place built by society's rejects. People no one else wanted...'_

 _* Early Roses are a type of potato_

 _* Boston Brahmins was a phrase coined by Oliver Wendell Holmes and refers to rare old families that came out on the Mayflower, Harvard types, and various highfalutin sorts._

 _* mavourneen (just to remind you) is Irish for darling. Conk is slang for a big nose, Mo is short for moustache._

 _* Red Oak is the provincial tree of Charlottetown._

Thank you very much to Janey who came up with Matthias Thistlethwaite and Winston Pegerim (the 'g' is a hard one, as in Peg). Genius, Jane, you really are tops! I hope they live up to their splendid names :o)

Thanks also to everyone who reviewed, I'm a bit pushed for time at the moment so I can't reply personally. I just want you know every word you write means the world to me!

...


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